UNIVERSITY  of  CALIFORNU 
AT' 
LOS  ANGELES 
LIBRARY 


?By  Abraliam  M^nBon,  M,  IB. 


The  Nervous  Housewife 

The  Foundations  of  Personality 


THE  FOUNDATIONS  OF 
PERSONALITY 


BY 


ABRAHAM  MYERSON,  M.D. 


♦   f » *  •*. 


BOSTON 

LITTLE,  BROWN,  AND  COMPANY 

1923 


1263^0 


Copyright,  19S1, 
Bt  Little,  Bhowk,  and  Compakt. 


All  rights  reserved 
Published  November,  1921 


Printed  in  tre  Ukited  States  or  Auebica 


E<L/ Psych. 
iJbrary 

v:v 


^  CONTENTS 

CHAPTIR  rAOl 

Introduction 1 

I    The  Organic  Basis  of  Character 7 

II    The  Environmental  Basis  of  Character  ....  25 

III    Memory  and  Habit 51 

«.        IV    Stimulation,  Inhibition,  Organizing  Energy,  Choice 

H^                  AND  Consciousness 70 

\         V    Hysteru,  Subconsciousness  and  Freudianism   .     .  86 


■I 


VI    Emotion,  Instinct,  Intelugence  and  Will  ...  99 

VII    Excitement,  Monotony  and  Interest 124 

VIII    The  Sentiments  of  Love,  Friendship,  Hate,  Pity 

and  Duty,  Compensation  and  Escape    ....  142 

IX    Energy  Release  and  the  Emotions 164 

X    Courage,  Resignation,  Sublimation,  Patience,  the 

Wish  and  Anhedonia 197 

XI  The  Evolution  of  Character  with  Especial  Ref- 
erence TO  THE  Growth  of  Purpose  and  Person- 
ality      213 

^    XII    The  Methods  of  Purpose — Work  Characters     .     .  257 

XIII  The  Qualities  of  the  Leader  and  the  Follower    .  275 

XIV  Sex  Characters  and  Domesticity 293 

XV    Play,  Recreation,  Humor  and  Pleasure  Seeking     .  314 

XVI    Religious  Characters.  Disharmony  in  Character     .  328 

XVII    Some  Character  Types 338 

Index 401 


Digitized  by  the  Internet  Archive 

in  2007  with  funding  from 

iVIierosoft  Corporation 


http://www.archive.org/details/foundationsofperOOmyeriala 


THE  FOUNDATIONS  OF 
PERSONALITY 


INTRODUCTION 

Man's  interest  in  character  is  founded  on  an  intensely 
practical  need.  In  whatsoever  relationship  we  deal 
with  our  fellows,  we  base  our  intercourse  largely  on  our 
understanding  of  their  characters.  The  trader  asks 
concerning  his  customer,  "  Is  he  honest? "  and  the 
teacher  asks  about  the  pupil,  "  Is  he  earnest?  "  The 
friend  bases  his  friendship  on  his  good  opinion  of  his 
friend;  the  foe  seeks  to  know  the  weak  points  in  the 
hated  one's  make-up;  and  the  maiden  yearning  for  her 
lover  whispers  to  herself,  "  Is  he  true?  "  Upon  our 
success  in  reading  the  character  of  others,  upon  our  un- 
derstanding of  ourselves  hangs  a  good  deal  of  our  life's 
success  or  failure. 

Because  the  feelings  are  in  part  mirrored  on  the  face 
and  body,  the  experience  of  mankind  has  become  crys- 
tallized in  beliefs,  opinions  and  systems  of  character 
reading  which  are  based  on  physiognomy,  shape  of  head, 
lines  of  hand,  gait  and  even  the  method  of  dress  and 
the  handwriting.  Some  of  these  all  men  believe  in,  at 
least  in  part.  For  example,  every  one  judges  character 
to  a  certain  extent  by  facial  expression,  manner,  carriage 
and  dress.  A  few  of  the  methods  used  have  become  or- 
ganized into  specialties,  such  as  the  study  of  the  head 


2       THE  FOUNDATIONS  OF  PERSONALITY 

or  phrenology,  and  the  study  of  the  hand  or  palmistry. 
All  of  these  systems  are  really  "  materialistic  "  in  that 
they  postulate  so  close  a  union  of  mind  and  body  as  to 
make  them  inseparable. 

But  there  are  grave  difficulties  in  the  way  of  charac- 
ter-judging by  these  methods.  Take,  for  example,  the 
study  of  the  physiognomy  as  a  means  to  character  un- 
derstanding. All  the  physiognomists,  as  well  as  the 
average  man,  look  upon  the  high,  wide  brow  as  related 
to  great  intelligence.  And  so  it  is  —  sometimes.  But 
it  is  also  found  in  connection  with  disease  of  the  brain, 
as  in  hydrocephalus,  and  in  old  cases  of  rickets.  You 
may  step  into  hospitals  for  the  feeble-minded  or  for  the 
insane  and  find  here  and  there  a  high,  noble  brow.  Con- 
versely you  may  attend  a  scientific  convention  and  find 
that  the  finest  paper  of  the  meeting  will  be  read  not 
by  some  Olympian-browed  member,  but  by  a  man  with 
a  low,  receding  forehead,  who  nevertheless  possesses  a 
high-grade  intellect. 

So  for  centuries  men  have  recognized  in  the  large 
aquiline  nose  a  sign  of  power  and  ability.  Napoleon's 
famous  dictum  that  no  man  with  this  type  of  proboscis 
is  a  fool  has  been  accepted  by  many,  most  of  whom, 
like  Napoleon  probably,  have  large  aquiline  noses.  The 
number  of  failures  with  this  facial  peculiarity  has  never 
been  studied,  nor  has  any  one  remarked  that  many  a 
highly  successful  man  has  a  snub  nose.  And  in  fact 
the  only  kind  of  a  nose  that  has  a  real  character  value 
is  the  one  presenting  no  obstruction  to  breathing.  The 
assigned  value  given  to  a  "  pretty  "  nose  has  no  relation 
to  character,  except  as  its  owner  is  vain  because  of  it. 

One  might  go  on  indefinitely  discussing  the  various 
features  of  the  face  and  discovering  that  only  a  vague 
relationship    to   character    existed.     The    thick,  moist 


INTRODUCTION  3 

lower  lip  is  the  sensual  lip,  say  the  physiognomists,  but 
there  are  saints  with  sensual  lips  and  chaste  thoughts. 
Squinty  eyes  may  indicate  a  shifty  character,  but  more 
often  they  indicate  conjunctivitis  or  some  defect  of  the 
optical  apparatus.  A  square  jaw  indicates  determina- 
tion and  courage,  but  a  study  of  the  faces  of  men  who 
won  medals  in  war  for  heroism  does  not  reveal  a  pre- 
ponderance of  square  jaws.  In  fact,  man  is  a  mosaic 
of  characters,  and  a  fine  nature  in  one  direction  may  be 
injured  by  a  defect  in  another;  even  if  one  part  of  the 
face  really  did  mean  something  definite,  no  one  could 
figure  out  its  character  value  because  of  the  influence 
of  other  features — contradictory,  inconsistent,  supple- 
mentary. Just  as  the  wisest  man  of  his  day  took  bribes 
as  Lord  Chancellor,  so  the  finest  face  may  be  invali- 
dated by  some  disharmony,  and  a  fatal  weakness  may 
disintegrate  a  splendid  character.  Moreover,  no  one 
really  studies  faces  disinterestedly,  impartially,  with- 
out prejudice.  We  like  or  dislike  too  readily,  we  are 
blinded  by  the  race,  sex  and  age  of  the  one  studied,  and, 
most  fatal  of  all,  we  judge  by  standards  of  beauty  that 
are  totally  misleading.  The  sweetest  face  may  hide  the 
most  arrant  egoist,  for  facial  beauty  has  very  little  to 
do  with  the  nature  behind  the  face.  In  fact,  facial 
make-up  is  more  influenced  by  diet,  disease  and  racial 
tendency  than  by  character. 

It  would  be  idle  to  take  up  in  any  detail  the  claims 
of  phrenologist  and  palmist.  The  former  had  a  very 
respectable  start  in  the  work  of  Broca  and  Gall  ^  in 
that  the  localization  of  function  in  the  various  parts 

^  It  is  to  be  remembered  that  phrenology  had  a  good  standing  at  one 
time,  though  it  has  since  lapsed  into  quackdom.  This  is  the  history 
of  many  a  "short  cut"  into  knowledge.  Thus  the  wisest  men  of  past 
centuries  believed  in  astrology.  Paracelsus,  who  gave  to  the  world 
the  use  of  Hg  in  therapeutics,  relied  in  large  part  for  his  diagnosis 
and  cures  upon  alchemy  and  astrology. 


4       THE  FOUNDATIONS  OF  PERSONALITY 

of  the  brain  made  at  least  partly  logical  the  belief  that 
the  conformation  of  the  head  also  indicated  functions 
of  character.  But  there  are  two  fatal  flaws  in  the 
system  of  phrenological  claims.  First,  even  if  there 
were  an  exact  cerebral  localization  of  powers,  which 
there  is  not,  it  would  by  no  means  follow  that  the  shape 
of  the  head  outlined  the  brain.  In  fact,  it  does  not, 
for  the  long-headed  are  not  long-brained,  nor  are  the 
short-headed  short-brained.  Second,  the  size  and  dis- 
posal of  the  sinuses,  the  state  of  nutrition  in  childhood 
have  far  more  to  do  with  the  "  bumps  "  of  the  head  than 
brain  or  character.  The  bump  of  philoprogenitiveness 
has  in  my  experience  more  often  been  the  result  of 
rickets  than  a  sign  of  parental  love. 

Without  meaning  to  pun,  we  may  dismiss  the  claims 
of  palmistry  offhand.  Normally  the  lines  of  the  hand  do 
not  change  from  birth  to  deatH,  but  character  does 
change.  The  hand,  its  shape  and  its  texture  are  mark- 
edly influenced  by  illness,^  toil  and  care.  And  gait,  car- 
riage, clothes  and  the  dozen  and  one  details  by  which 
we  judge  our  fellows  indicate  health,  strength,  training 
and  culture,  all  of  which  are  components  of  character, 
or  rather  are  characters  of  importance  but  give  no  clue 
to  the  deeper-lying  traits. 

As  a  matter  of  fact,  judgment  of  character  will  never 
be  attained  through  the  study  of  face,  form  or  hand. 
As  language  is  a  means  not  only  of  expressing  truth  but 
of  disguising  it,  so  these  surface  phenomena  are  as 
often  masks  as  guides.  Any  sober-minded  student  of 
life,  intent  on  knowing  himself  or  his  fellows,  will  seek 
no  royal  road  to  this  knowledge,  but  will  endeavor  to 
understand  the  fundamental  forces  of  character,  will 

*Xotably  is  the  shape  of  the  hand  changed  by  chronic  heart  and 
lung  disease  and  by  arthritis.  But  the  influence  of  the  endocrinal  se- 
cretions ia  very  great. 


INTRODUCTION  5 

strive  to  trace  the  threads  of  conduct  back  to  their  ori- 
gins in  motive,  intelligence,  instinct  and  emotion. 

We  have  emphasized  the  practical  value  of  some  sort 
of  character  analysis  in  dealing  with  others.  But  to 
know  himself  has  a  hugely  practical  value  to  every 
man,  since  upon  that  knowledge  depends  self-correction. 
For  "  man  is  the  only  animal  that  deliberately  under- , 
takes  while  reshaping  his  outer  world  to  reshape  him- 
self also."  ^  Moreover,  man  is  the  only  seeker  of  per- 
fection; he  is  a  deep,  intense  critic  of  himself.  To 
reach  nobility  of  character  is  not  a  practical  aim,  but 
is  held  to  be  an  end  sufficient  in  itself.  So  man  con- 
stantly probes  into  himself  —  "  Are  my  purposes  good ; 
is  my  will  strong  —  how  can  I  strengthen  my  control  — 
how  make  righteous  my  instincts  and  emotions?  "  It 
is  true  that  there  is  a  worship  —  and  always  has  been 
—  of  efficiency  and  success  as  against  character;  that 
man  has  tended  to  ask  more  often,  "  What  has  he 
done?  "  or,  "  What  has  he  got?  "  rather  than,  "  What  is 
he?  "  and  that  therefore  man  in  his  self -analysis  has 
often  asked,  "  How  shall  I  get? "  or,  "  How  shall  I 
do?"  In  the  largest  sense  these  questions  are  also 
questions  of  character,  for  even  if  we  discard  as  inade- 
quate the  psychology  which  considers  behavior  alone  as 
important,  conduct  is  the  fruit  of  character,  without 
which  it  is  sterile. 

This  book  does  not  aim  at  any  short  cuts  by  which 
man  may  know  himself  or  his  neighbor.  It  seeks  to 
analyze  the  fundamentals  of  personality,  avoiding  meta- 
physics as  the  plague.  It  does  not  define  character 
or  seek  to  separate  it  from  mind  and  personality. 
Written  by  a  neurologist,  a  physician  in  the  active 
practice  of  his  profession,  it  cannot  fail  to  bear  more 

*  Hocking. 


6       THE  FOUNDATIONS  OF  PERSONALITY 

of  the  imprint  of  medicine,  of  neurology,  than  of  psy- 
chology and  philosophy.  Yet  it  has  also  laid  under 
contribution  these  fields  of  human  effort.  Mainly  it 
will,  I  hope,  bear  the  marks  of  everyday  experience, 
of  contact  with  the  world  and  with  men  and  women 
and  children  as  brother,  husband,  father,  son,  lover, 
hater,  citizen,  doer  and  observer.  For  it  is  this  plural- 
ity of  contact  that  vitalizes,  and  he  who  has  not  drawn 
his  universals  of  character  out  of  the  particulars  of 
everyday  life  is  a  cloistered  theorist,  aloof  from  reality. 


CHAPTER  I 

THE   ORGANIC    BASIS    OF    CHARACTER 

The  history  of  Man's  thought  is  the  real  history  of 
mankind.  Back  of  all  the  events  of  history  are  the 
curious  systems  of  beliefs  for  which  men  have  lived 
and  died.  Struggling  to  understand  himself,  Man  has 
built  up  and  discarded  superstitions,  theologies  and 
sciences. 

Early  in  this  strange  and  fascinating  history  he 
divided  himself  into  two  parts — a  body  and  a  mind. 
Working  together  with  body,  mind  somehow  was  of 
different  stuff  and  origin  than  body  and  had  only  a 
mysterious  connection  with  it.  Theology  supported 
this  belief ;  metaphysics  and  philosophy  debated  it  with 
an  acumen  that  was  practically  sterile  of  usefulness. 
Mind  and  body  "  interacted  "  in  some  mysterious  way ; 
mind  and  body  were  "  parallel  "  and  so  set  that  thought- 
processes  and  brain-processes  ran  side  by  side  without 
really  having  anything  to  do  with  one  another.^  With 
the  development  of  modern  anatomy,  physiology  and 
psychology,  the  time  is  ripe  for  men  boldly  to  say  that 
applying  the  principle  of  causation  in  a  practical  man- 

*  William  James  in  Volume  1  of  his  "  Psychology "  gives  an  inter- 
esting r^sum^  of  the  theories  that  consider  the  relationship  of  mind 
(thought  and  consciousness)  to  body.  He  quotes  the  "lucky"  para- 
graph from  Tyndall,  **  The  passage  from  the  physics  of  the  brain  to 
the  corresponding  facts  of  consciousness  is  unthinkable.  Granted  that 
a  definite  thought  and  a  definite  molecular  action  in  the  brain  occur 
simultaneously;  we  do  not  possess  the  intellectual  organ,  or  apparently 
any  trace  of  the  organ  which  would  enable  us  to  pass  by  a  process  of 
reasoning   from   one   to   the   other."    This    is   the   "  parallel "   theory 


8       THE  FOUNDATIONS  OF  PERSONALITY 

/  ner  leaves  no  doubt  that  mind  and  character  are  organic, 
are  functions  of  the  organism  and  do  not  exist  inde- 
pendently of  it.  I  emphasize  "  practical  "  in  relation 
to  causation  because  it  would  be  idle  for  us  here  to 
enter  into  the  philosophy  of  cause  and  effect.  Such 
discussion  is  not  taken  seriously  by  the  very  philoso- 
phers who  most  earnestly  enter  into  it. 

The  statement  that  mind  is  a  function  of  the  organ- 
ism is  not  necessarily  "  materialistic."  The  body  is  a 
living  thing  and  as  such  is  as  "  spiritualistic  "  as  life 
itself.  Enzymes,  internal  secretions,  nervous  activities 
are  the  products  of  cells  whose  powers  are  indeed  drawn 
from  the  ocean  of  life. 

To  prove  this  statement,  which  is  a  cardinal  thesis 
of  this  book,  I  shall  adduce  facts  of  scientific  and  facts 
of  common  knowledge.  One  might  start  with  the  state- 
ment that  the  death-  of  the  body  brings  about  the  aboli- 
tion of  mind  and  character,  but  this,  of  course,  proves 
nothing,  since  it  might  well  be  that  the  body  was  a 
lever  for  the  expression  of  mind  and  character,  and 
with  its  disappearance  as  a  functioning  agent  such  ex- 
pression was  no  longer  possible. 

It  is  convenient  to  divide  our  exposition  into  two 
parts,  the  first  the  dependence  upon  proper  brain  func- 
tion and  structure,  and  the  second  the  dependence  upon 
the  proper  health  of  other  organs.  For  it  is  not  true 
:  that  mind  and  character  are  functions  of  the  brain 
alone;  they  are  functions  of  the  entire  organism.     The 

which  postulates  a  hideous  waste  of  energy  in  the  universe  and  which 
throws  out  of  count  the  same  kind  of  reasoning  by  which  Tyndall 
worked  on  light,  heat,  etc.  We  cannot  understand  the  beginning  and 
the  end  of  motion,  we  cannot  understand  causation.  Probably  when 
Tyndall's  thoughts  came  slowly  and  he  was  fatigued  he  said  —  "  Well, 
a  good  cup  of  coflFee  will  make  me  think  faster."  In  conceding  this 
practical  connection  between  mind  and  body,  every  "  spiritualist " 
philosopher  gives  away  his  case  whenever  he  rests  or  eats. 


THE  ORGANIC  BASIS  OF  CHARACTER        9 

brain  is  simply  the  largest  and  most  active  of  the  organs 
upon  which  the  mental  life  depends;  but  there  are 
minute  organs,  as  we  shall  see,  upon  whose  activity  the 
brain  absolutely  depends. 

Any  injury  to  the  brain  may  destroy  or  seriously  im- 
pair the  mentality  of  the  individual.  This  is  too  well 
known  to  need  detailed  exposition.  Yet  some  cases  of 
this  type  are  fundamental  in  the  exquisite  way  they 
prove  (if  anything  can  be  proven)  the  dependence  of 
mind  upon  bodily  structure. 

In  some  cases  of  fracture  of  the  skull,  a  piece  of 
bone  pressing  upon  the  brain  mey  profoundly  alter  mem- 
ory, mood  and  character.  Removal  of  the  piece  of 
bone  restores  the  mind  to  normality.  This  is  also  true 
of  brain  tumor  of  certain  types,  for  example,  frontal 
endotheliomata,  where  early  removal  of  the  growth 
demonstrates  first  that  a  "  physical "  agent  changes 
mind  and  character,  and  second  that  a  "  physical " 
agent,  such  as  the  knife  of  the  surgeon,  may  act  to 
reestablish  mentality. 

In  cases  of  hydrocephalus  (or  water  on  the  brain), 
where  there  is  an  abnormal  secretion  of  cerebro-spinal 
fluid  acting  to  increase  the  pressure  on  the  brain,  the 
simple  expedient  of  withdrawing  the  fluid  by  lumbar 
puncture  brings  about  normal  mental  life.  As  the  fluid 
again  collects,  the  mental  life  becomes  cloudy,  and  the 
character  alters  (irritability,  depressed  mood,  changed 
purpose,  lowered  will) ;  another  lumbar  puncture  and 
presto !  —  the  individual  is  for  a  time  made  over  more 
completely  than  conversion  changes  a  sinner, — and 
more  easily. 

Take  the  case  of  the  disease  known  as  General  Paresis, 
officially  called  Dementia  Paralytica.  This  disease  is 
caused  by  syphilis  and  is  one  of  its  late  results.     The 


10     THE  FOUNDATIONS  OF  PERSONALITY 

pathological  changes  are  widespread  throughout  the 
brain  but  may  at  the  onset  be  confined  mostly  to  the 
frontal  lobes.  The  very  first  change  may  be  —  and 
usually  is  —  a  change  in  character !  The  man  hitherto 
kind  and  gentle  becomes  irritable,  perhaps  even  brutal. 
One  whose  sex  morals  have  been  of  the  most  conven- 
tional kind,  a  loyal  husband,  suddenly  becomes  a  profli- 
gate, reckless  and  debauched,  perhaps  even  perverted. 
The  man  of  firm  purposes  and  indefatigable  industry 
may  lose  his  grip  upon  the  ambitions  and  strivings  of 
his  lifetime  and  become  an  inert  slacker,  to  the  amaze- 
ment of  his  associates.  Many  a  fine  character,  many  a 
splendid  mind,  has  reached  a  lofty  height  and  then 
crumbled  before  the  assaults  of  this  disease  upon  the 
brain.  Philosopher,  poet,  artist,  statesman,  captain  of 
industry,  handicraftsman,  peasant,  courtesan  and 
housewife, —  all  are  lowered  to  the  same  level  of  demen- 
tia and  destroyed  character  by  the  consequences  of  the 
thickened  meninges,  the  altered  blood  vessels  and  the 
injured  nerve  cells. 

Now  and  then  one  is  fortunate  enough  to  treat  with 
success  an  early  case  of  General  Paresis.  And  then 
the  reversed  miracle  takes  place,  unfortunately  too 
rarely!  The  disordered  mind,  the  altered  character, 
leaps  upward  to  its  old  place, —  after  being  dosed  by 
the  marvelous  drug  Salvarsan,  created  by  the  German 
Jewish  scientist,  Paul  Ehrlich. 

Of  extraordinary  interest  are  the  rare  cases  of  loss 
of  personal  identity  seen  after  brain  injury,  say  in  war. 
A  man  is  knocked  unconscious  by  a  blow  and  upon  res- 
toration of  consciousness  is  separated  from  that  past  in 
which  his  ego  resides.  He  does  not  know  his  history 
or  his  name,  and  that  continuity  of  the  "  self  "  so  deeply 
prized  and  held  by  all  religions  to  be  part  of  his  im- 


THE  ORGANIC  BASIS  OF  CHARACTER      11 

mortality  is  gone.  Then  after  a  little  while,  a  few  days 
or  weeks,  the  disarranged  neuronic  pathways  reestab- 
lish themselves  as  usual, —  and  the  ego  comes  back  to 
the  man. 

One  might  cite  the  feeble-mindedness  that  results  from 
meningitis,  brain  tumor,  brain  abscess,  brain  wounds, 
etc.,  as  further  evidence  of  the  dependence  of  mind  upon 
brain,  of  its  status  as  a  function  of  brain.  No  philoso- 
pher seriously  doubts  that  equilibrium  and  movement 
are  functions  of  the  brain,  and  yet  to  prove  this  there 
is  no  evidence  of  any  other  kind  than  that  cited  to 
prove  the  relationship  of  mind  to  brain.*  And  what 
applies  to  the  intelligence  applies  as  forcibly  to  char- 
acter, for  purpose,  emotion,  mood,  instinct  and  will  are 
altered  with  these  diseases. 

Interesting  as  is  the  relationship  between  mind  and 
character  and  the  brain,  it  is  at  the  present  overshad- 
owed by  the  fascinating  relationship  between  these 
psychical  activities  and  the  bodily  organs.  What  I  am 
about  to  cite  from  medicine  and  biology  is  part  of  the 
finest  achievements  of  these  sciences  and  hints  at  a 
future  in  which  a  true  science  of  mind  and  character  yj 
will  appear. 

Certain  of  the  glands  of  the  body  are  described  as 
glands  of  internal  secretions  in  that  the  products  of 
their  activity,  their  secretions,  are  poured  into  the  blood 
stream  rather  than  on  the  surface  of  the  body  or  into 
the   digestive    tract.     The   most    prominent    of    these 

*  Except  that  equilibrium  does  not  itself  judge  of  its  relationship 
to  brain,  whereas  mind  is  the  sole  judge  of  its  relationship  and  de- 
pendence on  brain.  Since  everything  in  the  world  is  a  mental  event, 
mentality  cannot  be  dependent  upon  anything,  and  everything  depends 
upon  mind  for  its  existence,  or  at  least  its  recognition.  But  we  get 
nowhere  by  such  "  logic  "  gone  mad.  Apply  the  same  kind  of  reasoning 
to  brain-mind,  body-mind  relationship  which  anatomists  and  physiolo- 
gists apply  to  other  functions,  and  one  can  no  longer  separate  body 
and  mind. 


12     THE  FOUNDATIONS  OF  PERSONALITY 

glands,  all  of  which  are  very  small  and  extraordinarily 
active,  are  as  follows : 

The  Pituitary  Body  (Hypophysis)  — a  tiny  struc- 
ture which  is  situated  at  the  base  of  the  brain  but  is 
not  a  part  of  that  organ. 

The  Pineal  Body  (Epiphysis)  — a  still  smaller  struc- 
ture, located  within  the  brain  substance,  having,  how- 
ever, no  relationship  to  the  brain.  This  gland  has  only 
lately  acquired  a  significance.  Descartes  thought  it 
the  seat  of  the  soul  because  it  is  situated  in  the  middle 
of  the  brain. 

The  Thyroid  gland,  a  somewhat  larger  body,  situated 
in  the  front  of  the  neck,  just  beneath  the  larynx.  We 
shall  deal  with  this  in  some  detail  later  on. 

The  Parathyroids,  minute  organs,  four  in  number, 
just  behind  the  thyroid. 

The  Thymus,  a  gland  placed  just  within  the  thorax, 
which  reaches  its  maximum  size  at  birth  and  then  grad- 
ually recedes  until  at  twenty  it  has  almost  disappeared. 

The  Adrenal  glands,  one  on  each  side  of  the  body, 
above  and  adjacent  to  the  kidney.  These  glands,  which 
are  each  made  up  of  two  opposing  structures,  stand  in 
intimate  relation  to  the  sympathetic  nervous  system 
and  secrete  a  substance  called  adrenalin. 

The  Sex  organs,  the  ovary  in  the  female  and  the  tes- 
ticle in  the  male,  in  addition  to  producing  the  female 
egg  (ovum)  and  the  male  seed  (sperm),  respectively, 
produce  substances  of  unknown  character  that  have 
hugely  important  roles  in  the  establishment  of  mind, 
temperament  and  sex  character. 

Without  going  into  the  details  of  the  functions  of 
the  endocrine  glands,  one  may  say  that  they  are  "  the 
managers  of  the  human  body."  Every  individual, 
from  the  time  he  is  born  until  the  time  he  dies,  is  under 


THE  ORGANIC  BASIS  OF  CHARACTER      13 

the  influence  of  these  many  different  kinds  of  elements, 
—  some  of  them  having  to  do  with  the  development  of 
the  bones  and  teeth,  some  with  the  development  of  the 
body  and  nervous  system,  some  with  the  development 
of  the  mind,  etc.  (and  character),  and  later  on  with 
reproduction.  These  glands  are  not  independent  of 
one  another  but  interact  in  a  marvelous  manner  so  that 
under  or  overaction  of  any  one  of  them  upsets  a  bal- 
ance that  exists  between  them,  and  thus  produces  a 
disorder  that  is  quite  generalized  in  its  effects.  The 
work  on  this  subject  is  a  tribute  to  medicine  and  one 
pauses  in  respect  and  admiration  before  the  names  and 
labors  of  Brown,  Sequard,  Addison,  Graves  and  Base- 
dow, Horsley,  King,  Schiff,  Schafer,  Takamine,  Marie, 
Cushing,  Kendal,  Sajous  and  others  of  equal  insight  and 
patient  endeavor. 

But  let  us  pass  over  to  the  specific  instances  that 
bear  on  our  thesis,  to  wit,  that  mind  and  character  are  •/ 
functions  of  the  organism  and  have  their  seat  not  only 
in  the  brain  but  in  the  entire  organism. 

How  do  the  endocrines  prove  this?  As  well  as  they 
prove  that  physical  growth  and  the  growth  of  the  sec- 
ondary sex  characters  are  dependent  on  these  glands. 
Take  diseases  of  the  thyroid  gland  as  the  first  and  shin- 
ing example. 

The  thyroid  secretes  a  substance  which  substantially 
is  an  "  iodized  globulin,"  —  and  which  can  be  separated 
from  the  gland  products.  This  secretion  has  the  main 
effect  of  "activating  metabolism"  (Vassale  and  Gen- 
erali) ;  in  ordinary  phrase  it  acts  to  increase  the  dis-  -^ 
charge  of  energy  of  the  cells  of  the  body.  In  all  living 
things  there  is  a  twofold  process  constantly  going  on : 
first  the  building  up  of  energy  by  means  of  the  food- 
stuffs, air  and  water  taken  in,  and  second  a  discharge 


14     THE  FOUNDATIONS  OF  PERSONALITY 

of  energy  in  the  form  of  heat,  motion  and  —  in  my  be- 
lief—  emotion  and  thought  itself,  though  this  would 
be  denied  by  many  psychologists.  Yet  how  escape  this 
conclusion  from  the  following  facts? 

There  is  a  congenital  disease  called  cretinism  which 
essentially  is  due  to  a  lack  of  thyroid  secretion.  This 
disease  is  particularly  prevalent  in  Southern  France, 
Spain,  Upper  Italy  and  Switzerland.  It  is  character- 
ized mainly  by  marked  dwarfism  and  imbecility,  so  that 
the  adult  untreated  cretin  remains  about  as  large  as 
a  three  or  four-year-old  child  and  has  the  mental  level 
about  that  of  a  child  of  the  same  age.  But  this  com- 
parison as  to  intelligence  is  a  gross  injustice  to  the 
child,  for  it  leaves  out  the  difference  in  character  be- 
tween the  child  and  the  cretin.  The  latter  has  none  of 
the  curiosity,  the  seeking  for  experience,  the  active  in- 
terest, the  pliant  expanding  will,  the  sweet  capacity  for 
affection,  friendship  and  love  present  in  the  average 
child.  The  cretin  is  a  travesty  on  the  human  being  in 
body,  mind  and  character. 

But  feed  him  thyroid  gland.  Mind  you,  the  dried 
substance  of  the  glands,  not  of  human  beings,  but  of 
mere  sheep.  The  cretin  begins  to  grow  mentally  and 
physically  and  loses  to  a  large  extent  the  grotesqueness 
of  his  appearance.  He  grows  taller;  his  tongue  no 
longer  lolls  in  his  mouth;  the  hair  becomes  finer,  the 
hands  less  coarse,  and  the  patient  exhibits  more  normal 
human  emotions,  purposes,  intelligence.  True,  he  does 
not  reach  normality,  but  that  is  because  other  defects 
beside  the  thyroid  defect  exist  and  are  not  altered  by 
the  thyroid  feeding. 

There  is  a  much  more  spectacular  disease  to  be  cited, 
—  a  relatively  infrequent  but  well-understood  condition 
called  myxoddema,  which  occurs  mainly  in  women  and 


THE  ORGANIC  BASIS  OF  CHARACTER      15 

is  also  due  to  a  deficiency  in  the  thyroid  secretion.  As 
a  result  the  patient,  who  may  have  been  a  bright,  capa- 
ble, energetic  person,  full  of  the  eager  purposes  and 
emotions  of  life,  gradually  becomes  dull,  stupid,  apa- 
thetic, without  fear,  anger,  love,  joy  or  sorrow,  and 
without  purpose  or  striving.  In  addition  the  body 
changes,  the  hair  becomes  coarse  and  scanty,  the  skin 
thick  and  swollen  (hence  the  name  of  the  disease)  and 
various  changes  take  place  in  the  sweat  secretion,  the 
heart  action,  etc. 

Then,  having  made  the  diagnosis,  work  the  great 
miracle !  Obtain  the  dried  thyroid  glands  of  the  sheep, 
prepared  by  the  great  drug  houses  as  a  by-product  of 
the  butcher  business,  and  feed  this  poor,  transformed 
creature  with  these  glands!  No  fairy  waving  a  magi- 
cal wand  ever  worked  a  greater  enchantment,  for  with 
the  first  dose  the  patient  improves  and  in  a  relatively 
short  time  is  restored  to  normal  in  skin,  hair,  sweat,  etc., 
and  mind  and  character]  To  every  physician  who  has 
seen  this  happen  under  his  own  eyes  and  by  his  direction 
there  comes  a  conviction  that  mind  and  character  have 
their  seat  in  the  organic  activities  of  the  body, —  and  no- 
where else. 

An  interesting  confirmation  of  this  is  that  when  the 
thyroid  is  overactive,  a  condition  called  hyperthyroid- 
ism, the  patient  becomes  very  restless  and  thin,  shows 
excessive  emotionality,  sleeplessness,  has  a  rapid  heart 
action,  tremor  and  many  other  signs  not  necessary  to 
detail  here.  The  thyroid  in  these  cases  is  usually  swol- 
len. One  of  the  methods  used  to  treat  the  disease  is  to 
remove  some  of  the  gland  surgically.  In  the  early  days 
an  operator  would  occasionally  remove  too  much  gland 
and  then  the  symptoms  of  myxosdema  would  occur. 
This  necessitated  the  artificial  feeding  of  thyroid  the 


16     THE  FOUNDATIONS  OF  PERSONALITY 

rest  of  the  patient's  life!  With  the  proper  dosage  of 
the  gland  substance  the  patient  remains  normal;  with 
too  little  she  becomes  dull  and  stupid;  with  too  much 
she  becomes  unstable  and  emotional ! 

There  are  plenty  of  other  examples  of  the  influence 
of  the  endocrines  on  mind,  character  and  personality.  I 
here  briefly  mention  a  few  of  these. 

In  the  disease  called  acromegaly,  which  is  due  to  a 
change  in  the  pituitary  gland,  amongst  other  things  are 
noted  "  melancholic  tendencies,  loss  of  memory  and 
mental  and  physical  torpor." 

A  very  profound  effect  on  character  and  personality, 
.  exclusive  of  intelligence,  is  that  of  the  sex  glands.  One 
need  not  accept  the  Freudian  extravagances  regarding 
the  way  in  which  the  sex  feelings  and  impulses  enter 
into  our  thoughts,  emotions,  purposes  and  acts.  No 
unbiased  observer  of  himself  or  his  fellows  but  knows 
that  the  satisfaction  or  non-satisfaction  of  the  sex  feel- 
-  ing,  its  excitation  or  its  suppression  are  of  great  im- 
vportance  in  the  destinies  of  character.  Further,  man 
as  herdsman  and  man  as  tyrant  have  carried  on  huge 
experiments  to  show  how  necessary  to  normal  charac- 
ter the  sex  glands  are. 

As  herdsman  he  has  castrated  his  male  Bos  and 
obtained  the  ox.  And  the  ox  is  the  symbol  of  patience, 
docility,  steady  labor,  without  lust  or  passion, —  and 
the  very  opposite  of  his  non-castrated  brother,  the  bull. 
The  bull  is  the  symbol  of  irritability  and  unteachable- 
ness,  who  will  not  be  easily  yoked  or  led  and  who  is  the 
incarnation  of  lust  and  passion.  One  is  the  male  trans- 
formed into  neuter  gender;  and  the  other  is  rampant 
with  the  fierceness  of  his  sex. 

Compare  the  eunuch  and  the  normal  man.  If  the 
eunuch  state  be  imposed  in  infancy,  the  shape  of  the 


THE  ORGANIC  BASIS  OF  CHARACTER      17 

body,  its  hairiness,  the  quality  of  the  voice  and  the 
character  are  altered  in  characteristic  manner.  The 
eunuch  essentially  is  neither  man  nor  woman,  but  a  re- 
pelling Something  intermediate. 

Enough  has  been  said  to  show  that  mind  and  char- 
acter are  dependent  upon  the  health  of  the  brain  and 
the  glands  of  the  body;  that  somewhere  in  the  inter-  . 
action  of  tissues,  in  the  chemistry  of  life,  arises  thought, 
purpose,  emotion,  conduct  and  deed.  But  we  need  not 
go  so  far  afield  as  pathology  to  show  this,  for  common 
experience  demonstrates  it  as  well. 

If  character  is  control  of  emotions,  firmness  of  pur-  "^ 
pose,  cheerfulness  of  outlook  and  vigor  of  thought  and 
memory,  then  the  tired  man,  worn  out  by  work  or  a 
long  vigil,  is  changed  in  character.  Such  a  person  in 
the  majority  of  cases  is  irritable,  showing  lack  of  con- 
trol and  emotion;  he  slackens  in  his  life's  purposes, 
loses  cheerfulness  and  outlook  and  finds  it  difficult  to 
concentrate  hisi  thoughts  or  to  recall  his  memories. 
Though  this  change  is  temporary  and  disappears  with 
rest,  the  essential  fact  is  not  altered,  namely,  fatigue  • 
alters  character.  It  is  also  true  that  not  all  persons 
show  this  vulnerability  to  fatigue  in  equal  measure. 
For  that  matter,  neither  do  they  show  an  equal  liability 
to  infectious  diseases,  equal  reaction  to  alcohol  or  in- 
jury. The  feeling  of  vigor  which  rest  gives  changes 
the  expression  of  personality  to  a  marked  degree.  It 
is  true  that  we  are  not  apt  to  think  of  the  tired  man 
as  changed  in  character;  yet  we  must  admit  on  reflec- 
tion that  he  has  undergone  transformation. 

Even  a  loaded  bowel  may,  as  is  well  known,  alter 
the  reaction  to  life.  Among  men  who  are  coarse  in 
their  language  there  is  a  salutation  more  pertinent  than 


18     THE  FOUNDATIONS  OF  PERSONALITY 

elegant  that  inquires  into  the  state  of  the  bowels.* 
The  famous  story  of  Voltaire  and  the  Englishman,  in 
which  the  sage  agreed  to  suicide  because  life  was  not 
worth  living  when  his  digestion  was  disordered  and 
who  broke  his  agreement  when  he  purged  himself,  illus- 
trates how  closely  mood  is  related  to  the  intestinal  tract. 
And  mood  is  the  background  of  the  psychic  life,  upon 
which  depends  the  direction  of  our  thoughts,  cheerful 
or  otherwise,  the  vigor  of  our  will  and  purpose.  Mood 
itself  arises  in  part  from  the  influences  that  stream  into 
the  muscles,  joints,  heart,  lungs,  liver,  spleen,  kidneys, 
digestive  tract  and  all  the  organs  and  tissues  by  way 
of  the  afferent  nerves  (sympathetic  and  cerebro-spinal). 
Mood  is  thus  in  part  a  reflection  of  the  health  and  proper 
working  of  the  organism;  it  is  the  most  important  as- 
pect of  the  subconsciousness,  and  upon  it  rests  the  struc- 
ture of  character  and  personality. 

This  does  not  mean  that  only  the  healthy  are  cheer- 
ful, or  that  the  sick  are  discouraged.  To  aflftrm  the 
dependence  of  mind  upon  body  is  not  to  deny  that 
one  may  build  up  faith,  hope,  courage,  through  example 
and  precept,  or  that  one  may  not  inherit  a  cheerfulness 
and  courage  (or  the  reverse).  "There  are  men,"  says 
James,  "who  are  born  under  a  cloud."  But  excep- 
tional individuals  aside,  the  mass  of  mankind  generates 
its  mood  either  in  the  tissues  of  the  body  or  in  the 
circumstances  of  life. 

Children,  because  they  have  not  built  up  standards 
of  thought,  mood  and  act,  demonstrate  in  a  remarkable 
manner  the  dependence  of  their  character  upon  health. 

'  What  is  called  coarse  is  frequently  crudely  true.  Thus,  in  the 
streets,  in  the  workshops,  and  where  men  untrammeled  by  niceties 
engage  in  personalities,  the  one  who  believes  the  other  to  be  a  "  crank  " 
informs  him  in  crude  language  that  he  has  intestinal  stasis  (to  put  the 
diagnosis  in  medical  language)  and  advises  him  accordingly  to  "take 
a  pill." 


THE  ORGANIC  BASIS  OF  CHARACTER      19 

A  child  shows  the  onset  of  an  illness  by  a  complete  , 
change  in  character.  I  remember  one  sociable,  amiable 
lad  of  two,  rich  in  the  curiosity  and  expanding  friend- 
liness of  that  time  of  life,  who  became  sick  with  diph- 
theria. All  his  basic  moods  became  altered,  and  all 
his  wholesome  reactions  to  life  disappeared.  He  was 
cross  and  contrary,  he  had  no  interest  in  people  or  in 
things,  he  acted  very  much  as  do  those  patients  in  an 
insane  hospital  who  suffer  from  Dementia  Praecox. 
What  is  character  if  it  is  not  interest  and  curiosity,  v'' 
friendliness  and  love,  obedience  and  trust,  cheerfulness 
and  courage?  Yet  a  sick  child,  especially  if  very  young, 
loses  all  these  and  takes  on  the  reverse  characters.  The 
little  lad  spoken  of  became  "  himself  "  again  when  the 
fever  and  the  pain  lifted.  Yet  for  a  long  time  after- 
ward he  showed  a  greater  liability  to  fear  than  before, 
and  it  was  not  until  six  months  or  more  had  repaired 
the  more  subtle  damage  to  his  organism  that  he  became 
the  hardy  little  adventurer  in  life  that  he  had  been  be- 
fore the  illness. 

There  is  plenty  of  chemical  proof  of  this  thesis  as 
here  set  forth.  Men  have  from  time  immemorial  put 
things  "  in  their  bellies  to  steal  their  brains  away." 
The  chemical  substance  known  as  ethyl  alcohol  has  been 
an  artificial  basis  of  good  fellowship  the  world  over,  as 
well  as  furnishing  a  very  fair  share  of  the  tragedy,  the 
misery  and  the  humor  of  the  world.  This  is  because, 
when  ingested  in  any  amount,  its  absorption  produces 
changes  in  the  flow  of  thought,  in  the  attitude  toward 
life,  in  the  mood,  the  emotions,  the  purposes,  the  con- 
duct,—  in  a  word,  in  character.  One  sees  the  austere 
man,  when  drunk,  become  ribald;  the  repressed,  close- 
fisted  become  open-mouthed  and  open-hearted;  the 
kindly,  perhaps  brutal;  the  controlled,  uncontrolled. 


20     THE  FOUNDATIONS  OF  PERSONALITY 

In  the  change  of  character  it  effects  is  the  regret  oyer 
its  passing  and  the  greatest  reason  for  prohibition. 

Alcohol  causes  several  well-defined  mental  diseases 
as  well  as  mere  drunkenness.  In  Delirium  Tremens 
there  is  an  acute  delirium,  with  confusion,  excitement 
and  auditory  and  visual  hallucinations  of  all  kinds. 
The  latter  symptom  is  so  prominent  as  to  give  the  reason 
for  the  popular  name  of  the  "  snakes."  In  alcoholic 
hallucinosis  the  patient  has  delusions  of  persecution 
and  hears  voices  accusing  him  of  all  kinds  of  wrong- 
doing. Very  frequently,  as  all  the  medical  writers  note, 
these  voices  are  "  conscience  exteriorized  " ;  that  is,  the 
voices  say  of  him  just  what  he  has  been  saying  of  him- 
self in  the  struggle  against  drink.  Then  there  is  Alco- 
holic Paranoia,  a  disease  in  which  the  main  change  is 
a  delusion  of  jealousy  directed  against  the  mate,  who 
is  accused  of  infidelity.  It  is  interesting  that  in  the  last 
two  diseases  the  patient  is  "  clear-headed  " ;  memory 
and  orientation  are  good;  the  patient  speaks  well  and 
gives  no  gross  signs  of  his  trouble.  As  the  effects  of 
the  alcohol  wear  away,  the  patient  recovers, —  i.e.,  his 
character  returns  to  its  normal. 

It  becomes  necessary  at  this  point  to  take  up  a  reverse 
side  of  our  study,  namely,  what  is  often  called  the  in- 
fluence of  "  mind  over  matter."  Such  cures  of  disease 
as  seem  to  follow  prayer  and  faith  are  cited;  such  in- 
cidents as  the  great  strength  of  men  under  emotion 
or  the  disturbances  of  the  body  by  ideas  are  listed  as 
examples.  This  is  not  the  place  to  discuss  cures  by 
faith.  It  sufftces  to  say  this:  that  in  the  first  place 
most  of  such  cures  relate  to  hysteria,  a  disease  we  shall 
discuss  later  but  which  is  characterized  by  symptoms 
that  appear  and  disappear  like  magic.  I  have  seen 
"cured"   (and  have  "cured")  such  patients,  affected 


THE  ORGANIC  BASIS  OF  CHARACTER      21 

with  paralysis,  deafness,  dumbness,  blindness,  etc.,  with 
reasoning,  electricity,  bitter  tonics,  fake  electrodes,  hyp- 
notism, and  in  one  case  by  a  forcible  slap  upon  a  promi- 
nent and  naked  part  of  the  body.  Hysteria  has  been 
the  basis  of  many  a  saint's  reputation  and  likewise  has 
aided  many  a  physician  into  affluence. 

Nor  is  the  effect  of  coincidence  taken  into  account 
in  estimating  cures,  whether  by  faith  or  by  drugs.  Many 
a  physician  has  owed  his  start  to  tlie  fact  that  he  was 
called  in  on  some  obscure  case  just  when  the  patient 
was  on  the  turn  towards  recovery.  He  then  receives 
the  credit  that  belonged  to  Nature.  Medical  men  un- 
derstand this, —  that  many  diseases  are  "  self-limited  " 
and  pass  through  a  cycle  influenced  but  little  by 
treatment.  But  faith  curists  do  not  so  understand, 
and  neither  does  the  mass  of  people,  so  that  neither  one 
nor  the  other  separates  "  post  hoc  '^  from  "  propter 
hoc/'  If  the  truth  were  told,  most  of  the  miracle  and 
faith  cures  that  are  not  of  hysterical  origin  are  due  to 
coincidence.  Faith  curists  report  in  detail  their  suc- 
cesses, but  we  have  no  statistics  whatever  of  their  fail- 
ures. 

If  thought  is  a  product  of  the  brain  activated  by  the 
rest  of  the  organism,  it  would  be  perfectly  natural  to 
expect  that  thought  would  influence  the  organism.  That 
thought  is  intimately  associated  with  impulses  to  action 
is  well  known.  This  action  largely  takes  place  in  the 
speech  muscles  but  also  it  irradiates  into  the  rest  of 
the  organism.  Especially  is  this  true  if  the  thought  is 
associated  with  some  emotion.  Emotion,  as  we  shall 
discuss  it  later,  is  at  least  in  large  part  a  bodily  reac- 
tion, a  disturbance  in  heart,  lungs,  abdominal  organs, 
blood  vessels,  sympathetic  nervous  system,  endocrines, 
etc.     The  effect  of  thought  and  emotion  upon  the  body, 


22     THE  FOUNDATIONS  OF  PERSONALITY 

whether  to  heighten  its  activity  or  to  lower  its  activity, 
is,  from  my  point  of  view,  merely  the  effect  of  one  func- 
tion of  the  organism  upon  others.  We  are  not  surprised 
if  digestion  affects  thinking  and  mood,  and  we  need  not 
be  surprised  if  thought  and  mood  disturb  or  improve 
digestion.  And  we  may  substitute  for  digestion  any 
other  organic  function. 

As  a  working  basis,  substantiated  by  the  kind  of 
proof  we  use  in  our  daily  lives  in  laboratories  and  ma- 
chine shops,  we  may  state  that  mind,  character  and 
personality  are  organic  in  their  origin  and  are  functions 
of  the  entire  organism.  What  a  man  thinks,  does  and 
feels  (or  perhaps  we  should  reverse  this  order)  is  the 
result  of  environmental  forces  playing  upon  a  marvel- 
ously  intricate  organism  in  which  every  part  reacts 
on  every  other  part,  in  which  nervous  energy  influences 
digestion  and  digestion  influences  nervous  energy,  in 
which  enzymes,  hormones,  and  endocrines  engage  in  an 
extraordinary  game  of  checks  and  balance,  which  in  the 
normal  course  of  events  make  for  the  individual's  wel- 
fare. What  a  man  thinks,  does,  and  feels  influences 
the  fate  of  his  organism  from  one  end  of  life  to  the 
other. 

We  have  not  adduced  in  favor  of  the  organic  nature 
of  mind,  character  and  personality  the  facts  of  heredity. 
This  is  a  most  important  set  of  facts,  for  if  the  egg 
and  the  sperm  carry  mentality  and  personality,  they 
may  be  presumed  to  carry  them  in  some  organic  form, 
as  organic  potentialities,  just  as  they  carry  size,^  color, 

*  I  have  collected  and  published  from  the  records  and  wards  of  the 
State  Hospital  at  Taunton,  Mass.,  many  such  cases.  The  whole  subject 
is  to  be  reviewed  in  a  following  book  on  the  transmission  of  mental 
disease,  but  no  one  seriously  doubts  that  there  is  a  transference  of 
"  insane "  character  from  generation  to  generation.  In  fact,  I  believe 
that  a  little  too  much  stress  has  been  laid  on  this  aspect  of  mental 
disease  and  not  enou;;h  on  the  fact  that  sickness  may  injure  a  family 


THE  OKGANIC  BASIS  OF  CHARACTER      23 

sex,  etc.  That  abnormal  mind  is  inherited  is  shown 
in  family  insanity  in  the  second,  third  and  fourth  gen- 
eration cases  of  mental  disease.  Certain  types  of 
feeble-mindedness  surely  are  transmitted  from  genera- 
tron  to  generation,  as  witness  the  case  of  the  famous  (or 
infamous)  Jukes  family.  In  this  group  vagabondage, 
crime,  immorality  and  other  character  abnormalities 
appeared  linked  with  the  feeble-mindedness.  But  there 
is  plenty  of  evidence  to  show  that  normal  character 
qualities  are  inherited  as  well  as  the  abnormal.*  Galton, 
the  father  of  eugenics,  collected  facts  from  the  history 
of  successful  families  to  prove  this.  It  is  true  that 
he  failed  to  take  into  account  the  facts  of  social  heredity, 
in  that  a  gifted  man  establishes  a  place  for  himself  and 
a  tradition  for  his  family  that  is  of  great  help  to  his 
son.  Nevertheless,  musical  ability  runs  in  families  and 
races,  as  does  athletic  ability,  high  temper,  passion,  etc. 
In  short,  at  least  the  potentialities,  the  capacities  for 
character,  are  transmitted  together  with  other  qualities 
as  part  of  the  capital  of  heredity. 

This  means  that  in  studying  character  and  person-  y 
ality,  we  must  start  with  an  analysis  of  the  physical 
make-up  of  the  individual.  We  are  not  yet  at  the  point 
in  science  where  we  can  easily  get  at  the  activities  of  the 
endocrinal  glands  in  normal  mentality.  We  are  able 
to  recognize  certain  fundamental  types,  but  more  we 
cannot  do;  nor  are  we  able  to  measure  nervous  energy 
except  in  relatively  crude  ways,  but  these  crude  ways 
have  great  value  under  certain  conditions. 

When  there  has  been  a  change  in  personality,  the  v 

stock  and  cause  the  descendants  to  be  insane.  Any  one  who  has  seen 
a  single  case  of  congenital  General  Paresis,  where  a  child  has  a  mental 
disease  due  to  the  syphilis  of  a  parent,  and  can  doubt  that  character 
and  mind  are  organic,  simply  is  blinded  by  theological  or  metaphysical 
prejudice. 
*  See  his  book  "  Genius." 


24     THE  FOUNDATIONS  OF  PERSONALITY 

question  of  bodily  disease  is  always  paramount.  The 
first  questions  to  be  asked  under  such  circumstances  are, 
"  Is  this  person  sick?  "  "  Is  the  brain  involved?  "  "  Are 
endocrinal  glands  involved?  "  "  Is  there  disease  of  some 
organ  of  the  body,  acting  to  lower  the  feeling  of  well- 
being,  acting  to  slacken  the  purposes  and  the  will  or  to 
obscure  the  intelligence?  " 

There  are  other  important  questions  of  this  type  to 
answer,  some  of  which  may  be  deferred  for  the  time. 
Meanwhile,  the  next  equally  fundamental  thesis  is  on 
the  effect  of  the  environment  upon  mind,  character  and 
personality. 


CHAPTER  II 

THE  BNVIBONMENTAL  BASIS  OP  CHARACTER 

From  the  time  any  one  of  us  is  bom  into  the  world 
he  is  subject  to  the  influences  of  forces  that  reach 
backwards  to  the  earliest  days  of  the  race.  The  "  dead 
hand"  rules, —  yes,  and  the  dead  thought,  belief  and 
custom  continue  to  shape  the  lives  and  character  of 
the  living.  The  invention  and  development  of  speech 
and  writing  have  brought  into  every  man's  career  the 
mental  life  and  character  of  all  his  own  ancestors  and 
the  ancestors  of  every  other  man. 

A  child  is  not  bom  merely  to  a  father  and  a  mother. 
He  is  bom  to  a  group,  fiercely  and  definitely  prejudiced 
in  custom,  belief  and  ideal,  with  ways  of  doing,  feeling 
and  thinking  which  it  seeks  to  impose  on  each  of  its  new 
members.  Family,  tribe,  race  and  nation  all  demand 
of  each  accession  that  he  accept  their  ideals,  habits 
and  beliefs  on  peril  of  disapproval  and  even  of  punish- 
ment. And  man  is  so  constituted  that  the  approval  and 
disapproval  of  his  group  mean  more  to  him  even  than 
his  life. 

The  social  setting  into  which  each  one  is  born  is  his 
"  social  heredity."  *  "  The  heredity  with  which  civiliza- 
tion is  most  supremely  concerned,"  says  Sir  Edwin  Ray 
Lankester,  "is  not  that  which  is  inborn  in  the  indi- 
vidual. It  is  the  social  inheritance  which  constitutes 
the  dominant  factor  in  human  progress."  ^     It  is  this 

*The  Eugenists  fiercely  contest  this  statement,  and  rightly,  for  it  is 
extreme.  Society  is  threatened  at  its  roots  by  the  present  high  birth 
rate  of  the  low  grade  and  the  low  birth  rate  of  the  high  grade.     En- 


26     THE  FOUNDATIONS  OF  PERSONALITY 

social  inheritance  which  shapes  our  characters,  rough- 
hewn  by  nature.  It  is  by  the  light  of  each  person's 
social  inheritance  that  we  must  also  judge  his  charac- 
ter. 

"  Education,"  says  Oliver  Wendell  Holmes,  "  is  only 
second  to  nature.  Imagine  all  the  infants  born  this 
year  in  Boston  and  Timbuctoo  to  change  places !  "  And 
education  is  merely  social  inheritance  organized  by  par- 
ents and  teachers  for  the  sake  of  molding  the  scholar 
into  usefulness  and  conformity  to  the  group  into  which 
he  is  born.  There  may  be  in  each  individual  an  innate 
capacity  for  this  ability  or  that,  for  expressing  and  con- 
trolling this  or  that  emotion,  for  developing  this  or 
that  purpose.  Which  ability  will  be  developed,  which 
emotion  or  purpose  will  be  expressed,  is  a  matter  of  the 
age  in  which  a  man  is  bom,  the  country  in  which  he 
lives,  the  family  which  claims  him  as  its  own.  In  a 
warrior  age  the  fighting  spirit  chooses  war  as  its  voca- 
tion and  develops  a  warlike  character;  in  a  peaceful 
time  that  same  fighting  spirit  may  seek  to  bring  about 
such  reforms  as  will  do  away  with  war.^  When  the 
world  said  that  a  man  might  and  really  ought  now  and 
then  to  beat  his  wife  and  rule  her  by  force,  the  really 
conformable  man  did  so,  while  his  descendant,  living 
in  a  time  and  country  where  woman  is  the  domestic 

vironment,  culture,  can  do  much,  but  they  cannot  make  a  silk  purse  out 
of  a  sow's  ear.  Neither  can  heredity  make  a  silk  purse  out  of  silk; 
without  culture  and  the  environmental  influenees,  without  social  hered- 
ity, the  silk  remains  crude  and  with  no  special  value.  The  aims  of 
a  rational  society,  which  we  are  born  a  thousand  years  too  soon  to 
see,  would  be  twofold:  to  control  marriage  and  birth  so  that  the  num- 
ber of  the  unfit  would  be  kept  as  low  as  possible,  and  then  to  bring 
fostering  influences  to  bear  on  the  fit. 

^  Indeed,  a  reformer  is  to-day  called  a  crusader,  though  the  knight  of 
the  twelfth  century  armed  cap-S,-pie  for  a  joust  with  the  Saracen  would 
hardly  recognize  as  his  spiritual  descendant  a  sedentary  person  preach- 
ing against  rum.  Yet  to  the  student  of  character  there  is  nothing 
anomalous  in  the  transformation. 


ENVIRONMENTAL  BASIS  OF  CHARACTER     27 

"  boss,"  submits,  humorously  and  otherwise,  to  a  good- 
natured  henpecking.  And  in  the  times  where  a  woman 
had  no  vocation  but  that  of  housewife,  the  wife  of  larger 
ability  merely  became  a  discontented,  futile  woman; 
whereas  in  an  age  which  opens  up  politics  to  her,  the 
same  type  of  person  expands  into  a  vigorous,  dominat- 
ing political  leader.  Though  the  force  of  the  water  / 
remain  the  same,  the  nature  of  the  land  determines 
whether  the  water  shall  collect  as  a  river,  carrjdng  the 
produce  of  the  land  to  the  sea,  or  as  a  stagnant  lake  in 
which  idlers  fish.  Time,  social  circumstances,  educa-  i 
tion  and  a  thousand  and  one  factors  determine  whether 
one  shall  be  a  "  Village  Hampden,"  quarreling  in  a 
petty  way  with  a  petty  autocrat  over  some  petty  thing, 
or  a  national  Hampden,  whose  defiance  of  a  tyrannical 
king  stirs  a  nation  into  revolt. 

How  conceptions  of  right  and  wrong,  of  proper  and 
improper  conduct,  ideals  and  thoughts  arise,  it  is  not 
my  function  to  treat  in  detail.  That  intelligence  pri- 
marily uses  the  method  of  trial  and  error  to  learn  is 
as  true  of  groups  as  of  individuals;  and  established 
methods  of  doing  things  —  customs  —  are  often  enough 
temporary  conclusions,  though  they  last  a  thousand 
years.  The  feeling  that  such  group  customs  are  right 
and  that  to  depart  from  them  is  wrong,  is  perhaps  based 
on  a  specific  instinct,  the  moral  instinct ;  but  much  more 
likely,  in  my  opinion,  is  it  obedience  to  leadership,  fear 
of  social  disapproval  and  punishment,  conscience,  imita- 
tion, suggestibility  and  sympathy,  all  of  which  are  parts 
of  that  social  cement  substance,  the  social  instinct.  No 
child  ever  learns  "  what  is  right  and  wrong "  except 
through  teaching,  but  no  child  would  ever  conform, 
except  through  gross  fear,  unless  he  found  himself  urged 
by  deep-seated  instincts  to  be  in  conformity,  in  harmony 


28     THE  FOUNDATIONS  OF  PERSONALITY 

and  in  sympathy  with  his  group, —  to  be  one  with  that 
group.  Perhaps  it  is  true,  as  Bergson  suggests,  as 
Galton  ^  hints  and  as  Samuel  Butler  boldly  states,  that 
there  are  no  real  individuals  in  life  but  we  are  merely 
different  aspects  of  reality  or,  to  phrase  it  materialis- 
tically, corpuscles  in  the  blood  stream  of  an  organism 
too  vast  and  complicated  to  be  encompassed  by  our 
imagination.  Just  as  a  white  blood  cell  obeys  laws  of 
which  it  can  have  no  conception,  fulfills  purposes  whose 
meaning  transcends  its  own  welfare,  so  we,  with  all  our 
self-consciousness  and  all  the  paraphernalia  of  indi- 
viduality, are  perhaps  parts  of  a  life  we  cannot  under- 
stand. 

Perhaps  such  a  unity  is  the  basis  of  instinct,  of  knowl- 
edge without  teaching,  of  desire  and  wish  that  has  not 
the  individual  welfare  as  its  basis.  No  man  can  reject 
biich  phenomena  as  telepathy  or  thought  transference 
merely  because  he  cannot  understand  them  on  a  basis 
of  strict  human  individuality.  To  reject  because  one 
cannot  understand  is  the  arrogance  of  the  "  clerico- 
academic  "  type  of  William  James. 

No  one  can  read  the  stories  of  travelers  or  the  writ- 
ings of  anthropologists  without  concluding  that  codes 

*  For  example,  read  what  the  hard-headed  Galton  says  ("Hereditary 
Genius,"  p.  376): 

"  There  is  decidedly  a  solidarity  as  well  as  a  separateness  in  all 
human  and  probably  in  all  lives  whatsoever,  and  this  consideration 
goes  far,  I  think,  to  establish  an  opinion  that  the  constitution  of  the 
living  universe  is  a  pure  theism  and  that  its  form  of  activity  is  what 
may  be  described  as  cooperative.  It  points  to  the  conclusion  that  all 
life  is  single  in  its  essence,  but  various,  ever-varying  and  interactive 
in  its  manifestations,  and  that  men  and  all  other  living  animals  are 
active  workers  and  sharers  in  a  vastly  more  extended  system  of  cosmic 
action  than  any  of  ourselves,  much  less  of  them,  can  possibly  compre- 
hend. It  also  suggests  that  they  may  contribute,  more  or  less  un- 
consciously, to  the  manifestation  of  a  far  higher  life  than  our  ovm, 
somewhat  as  ...  the  individual  cells  of  one  of  the  more  complex 
animals  contribute  to  the  manifestations  of  its  higher  order  of  per- 
sonality." 


ENVIRONMENTAL  BASIS  OF  CHARACTER     29 

of  belief  and  action  arise  out  of  the  efforts  of  groups 
to  understand  and  to  influence  nature  and  that  out  of 
this  practical  effort  and  seeking  of  a  harmonious  real- 
ity arises  morality.  "  Man  seeks  the  truth,  a  world 
that  does  not  contradict  itself,  that  does  not  deceive, 
that  does  not  change ;  a  real  world, —  a  world  in  which 
there  is  no  suffering.  Contradiction,  deception  and 
variability  are  the  causes  of  suffering.  He  does  not 
doubt  there  is  such  a  thing  as  a  world  as  it  might  be, 
and  he  would  fain  find  a  road  to  it."  ^  But  alas,  intelli- 
gence and  knowledge  both  are  imperfect,  and  one  group 
seeking  a  truth  that  will  bring  them  good  crops,  fine 
families,  victory  over  enemies,  riches,  power  and  fellow- 
ship, as  well  as  a  harmonious  universe,  finds  it  in  idol 
worship  and  polygamy ;  another  group  seeking  the  same 
truth  finds  it  in  Christianity  and  monogamy.  And  the 
members  of  some  groups  are  bom  to  ideals,  customs  and 
habits  that  make  it  right  for  a  member  to  sing  obscene 
songs  and  to  be  obscene  at  certain  periods,  to  kill  and 
destroy  the  enemy,  to  sacrifice  the  unbeliever,  to  wor- 
ship a  clay  image,  to  have  as  many  wives  as  possible, 
and  that  make  it  torong  to  do  otherwise.  Indeed,  he 
who  wishes  a  child  to  believe  absolutely  in  a  code  of 
morals  would  better  postpone  teaching  him  the  customs 
and  beliefs  of  other  people  until  habit  has  made  him 
adamant  to  new  ideas. 

It  is  with  pleasure  that  I  turn  the  attention  of  the 
reader  to  the  work  of  Frazier  in  the  growth  of  human 
belief,  custom  and  institutions  that  he  has  incorporated 
into  the  stupendous  series  of  books  called  "  The  Golden 
Bough."  The  things  that  influence  us  most  in  our 
lives  are  heritages,  not  much  changed,  from  the  beliefs 
of  primitive  societies.     Believing  that  the  forces  of  the 

*  Nietzsche. 


30     THE  FOUNDATIONS  OF  PERSONALITY 

world  were  animate,  like  himself,  and  that  they  might 
be  moved,  persuaded,  cajoled  and  frightened  into  favor- 
able action,  undeveloped  man  based  most  of  his  customs 
on  efforts  to  obtain  some  desired  result  from  the  gods. 
Out  of  these  customs  grew  the  majority  of  our  institu- 
tions; out  of  these  queer  beliefs  and  superstitions,  out 
of  witchcraft,  sympathetic  magic,  the  "  Old  Man  "  idea, 
the  primitive  reaction  to  sleep,  epilepsy  and  death  grew 
medicine,  science,  religion,  festivals,  the  kingship,  the 
idea  of  soul  and  most  of  the  other  governing  and  direct- 
ing ideas  of  our  lives.  It  is  true  that  the  noble  beliefs 
and  sciences  also  grew  from  these  rude  seeds,  but  with 
them  and  permeating  our  social  structure  are  crops  of 
atrophied  ideas,  hampering  customs,  cramping  ideals. 
Further,  in  every  race  in  every  counti*y,  in  every  family, 
there  are  somewhat  different  assortments  of  these  di- 
recting traditional  forces ;  and  it  is  these  social  inherit- 
ances which  are  more  responsible  for  difference  in 
people  than  a  native  difference  in  stock. 

Consider  the  difference  that  being  born  and  brought 
up  in  Turkey  and  being  born,  let  us  say,  in  New  York 
City,  would  make  in  two  children  of  exactly  the  same 
disposition,  mental  caliber  and  physical  structure.  One 
would  grow  up  a  Turk  and  the  other  a  New  Yorker,  and 
the  mere  fact  that  they  had  the  same  original  capacity 
for  thought,  feeling  and  action  would  not  alter  the 
result  that  in  character  the  two  men  would  stand  almost 
at  opposite  poles.  One  need  not  judge  between  them 
and  say  that  one  was  superior  to  the  other,  for  while 
I  feel  that  the  New  Yorker  might  stand  our  inspection 
better,  I  am  certain  that  the  Turk  would  be  more  pleas- 
ing to  Turkish  ideas.  The  point  is  that  they  would  be 
different  and  that  the  differences  would  result  solely 


ENVIRONMENTAL  BASIS  OF  CHARACTER     31 

from  the  environmental  forces  of  natural  conditions  and 
social  inheritance. 

Study  the  immigrant  to  the  United  States  and  his 
descendant,  American  born  and  bred.  Compare  Irish- 
man and  Irish-American,  Russian  Jew  and  his  Ameri- 
can-born descendant;  compare  Englishman  and  the 
Anglo-Saxon  New  England  descendant.  Here  is  a  race, 
the  Jew,  which  in  the  Ghetto  and  under  circumstances 
that  built  up  a  tremendously  powerful  set  of  traditions 
and  customs  developed  a  very  distinctive  type  of  human 
being.  Poor  in  physique,  with  little  physical  pugnacity, 
but  worshiping,  learning  and  reaching  out  for  wealth 
and  power  in  an  unusually  successful  manner,  the  cru- 
cible of  an  adverse  and  hostile  environment  rendered 
him  totally  different  in  manners  from  his  Gentile  neigh- 
bors. With  a  high  birth  rate  and  an  intensely  close 
and  pure  family  life,  the  Ghetto  Jew  lived  and  died  shut 
off  by  the  restrictions  placed  upon  him  and  his  own 
social  heredity  from  the  life  of  the  country  of  his  birth. 
Then  came  immigration  to  the  United  States  through 
one  cause  or  another, —  and  note  the  results. 

With  the  old  social  heredity  still  at  work,  another 
set  of  customs,  traditions  and  beliefs  comes  into  open 
competition  with  it  in  the  bosom  of  the  American  Jew. 
Nowhere  is  the  struggle  between  the  old  and  the  new 
generations  so  intense  as  in  the  home  of  the  Orthodox 
Jew.  His  descendant  is  clean-shaven  and  no  longer 
observes  (or  observes  only  perfunctorily  or  with  many 
a  gross  inconsistency)  the  dietary  and  household  laws. 
He  is  a  free  spender  and  luxurious  in  his  habits  as 
compared  with  his  economical,  ascetic  forefathers.  He 
marries  late  and  the  birth  rate  drops  with  most  aston- 
ishing rapidity,  so  that  in  one  generation  the  children 
of  parents  who  had  eight  or  ten  children  have  families 


32     THE  FOUNDATIONS  OF  PERSONALITY 

of  one  or  two  or  three  children.  He  becomes  a  follower 
of  sports,  and  with  his  love  for  scholarship  still  strong, 
as  witness  his  production  of  scholars  and  scientists,  the 
remarkable  rise  of  the  Jewish  prize  fighter  stands  out 
as  a  divergence  from  tradition  that  mocks  at  theories 
of  inborn  racial  characters.  And  a  third  generation 
differs  in  customs,  manners,  ideals,  purposes  and  phy- 
sique but  little  from  the  social  class  of  Americans  in 
which  the  individual  members  move.  The  names  be- 
come Anglicized;  gone  are  the  Abrahams  and  Isaacs 
and  Jacobs,  the  Rachels  and  Leahs  and  Rebeccas,  and 
in  their  place  are  Vernon,  Mortimer,  Winthrop,  Alice, 
Helen  and  Elizabeth.  And  this  change  in  name  sym- 
bolizes the  revolution  in  essential  characters. 

Has  the  racial  stock  changed  in  one  generation  or 
two?  No.  A  new  social  heredity  has  overcome  —  or  at 
least  in  part  supplanted  —  an  older  social  heredity  and 
released  and  developed  characters  hitherto  held  in  check. 
In  every  human  being  —  and  this  is  a  theme  we  shall 
enlarge  upon  later  —  there  are  potential  lines  of  de- 
velopment far  outnumbering  those  that  can  be  mani- 
fested, and  each  environment  and  tradition  calls  forth 
some  and  suppresses  others.  Every  man  is  a  garden 
planted  with  all  hinds  of  seeds;  tradition  and  teaching 
are  the  gardeners  that  allow  only  certain  ones  to  come 
to  hloom.  In  each  age,  each  country  and  each  family 
there  is  a  different  gardener  at  work,  repressing  certain 
trends  in  the  individual,  favoring  and  bringing  to  an 
exaggerated  growth  other  trends. 

That  each  family,  or  type  of  family,  acts  in  this  way 
is  recognized  in  the  value  given  to  the  home  life.  The 
home,  because  of  its  sequestration,  allows  for  the  growth 
of  individual  types  better  than  would  a  community 
house  where  the  same  traditions  and  ideals  governed 


ENVIRONMENTAL  BASIS  OF  CHARACTER     33 

the  life  of  each  child.  In  the  home  the  parents  seek  to 
cultivate  the  specific  type  of  character  they  favor.  The 
home  is  par  excellence  the  place  where  prejudice  and 
social  attitude  are  fostered.  Though  the  mother  and 
father  seek  to  give  broadmindedness  and  wide  culture 
to  the  child,  their  efforts  must  largely  be  governed  by 
their  own  attitudes  and  reactions, —  in  short,  by  their 
own  character  and  the  resultant  examples  and  teaching. 
It  is  true  that  the  native  character  of  the  child  may 
make  him  resistant  to  the  teachings  of  the  parents  or 
may  even  develop  counter-prejudices,  to  react  violently 
against  the  gardening.  This  is  the  case  when  the  child 
is  of  an  opposing  temperament  or  when  in  the  course 
of  time  he  falls  under  the  influence  of  ideals  and  tradi- 
tions that  are  opposed  to  those  of  his  home.  Unless 
the  home  combines  interest  and  freedom,  together  with 
teaching,  certain  children  become  violent  rebels,  and, 
seeking  freedom  and  interest  outside  of  the  home,  find 
themselves  in  a  conflict,  both  with  their  home  teaching 
and  the  home  teachers,  that  shakes  the  unity  and  the 
happiness  of  parent  and  child.  Like  all  civil  wars 
this  war  between  new  and  old  generations  reaches  great 
bitterness. 

In  studying  the  cases  of  several  hundred  delinquent 
girls,  as  a  consultant  to  the  Parole  Department  of  Mas- 
sachusetts, it  was  found  that  the  family  life  of  the 
girls  could  be  classified  in  two  ways.  The  majority  of 
the  girls  that  reached  the  Reformatory  came  from  bad 
homes, —  homes  in  which  drunkenness,  prostitution, 
feeble-mindedness,  and  insanity  were  common  traits  of 
the  parents.  Or  else  the  girls  were  orphans  brought  up 
by  a  stepmother  or  some  careless  foster  mother.  In  any 
case,  through  either  example,  cruelty  or  neglect,  they 
drifted  into  the  streets. 


34     THE  FOUNDATIONS  OF  PERSONALITY 

And  the  streets!  Only  the  poor  child  (or  the  child 
brought  up  over  strictly)  can  know  the  lure  of  the 
streets.  There  is  excitement,  there  is  freedom  from 
prohibitions  and  inhibitions.  So  the  boy  or  girl  finds 
a  world  without  discipline,  is  without  the  restraints 
imposed  on  the  sex  instincts  and  comes  under  the  in- 
fluence of  derelicts,  sex-adventurers,  thieves,  vagabonds 
and  the  aimless  of  all  sorts.  Into  this  university  of  the 
vices  most  of  the  girls  I  am  speaking  of  drifted,  largely 
because  the  home  influence  either  was  of  the  street  type 
or  had  no  advantages  to  offer  in  competition  with  the 
street. 

But  the  child  on  the  streets  is  no  more  a  solitary 
individual  than  the  savage  is,  or  for  that  matter  the 
civilized  man.  He  quickly  forms  part  of  a  group,  a 
roving  group,  called  "  The  Gang."  In  the  large  cities 
gangs  are  usually  composed  of  boys  of  one  age  or  nearly 
so;  in  the  small  towns  the  gangs  will  consist  of  the 
boys  of  a  neighborhood.  In  fact,  regardless  of  whether 
they  are  street  children  or  home  children,  boys  form 
gangs  spontaneously.  The  gang  is  the  first  voluntary 
organization  of  society,  for  the  home,  in  so  far  as  the 
child  is  concerned,  is  an  involuntary  organization.  The 
gang  has  its  leader  or  leaders,  usually  the  strongest  or 
the  best  fighter.  At  any  rate,  the  best  fighter  is  the 
nominal  leader,  though  a  shrewder  lad  may  assume  the 
real  power.  The  gang  has  rules,  it  plays  according  to 
regulations,  its  quarrels  are  settled  according  to  a  code, 
property  has  a  definite  status  and  distribution.^     The 

*In  the  gang  of  which  I  was  a  member  there  was  a  ritual  in  the 
formation  of  partnership,  an  association  within  the  association.  Two 
boys,  fond  of  each  other  and  desiring  to  become  partners,  would  link 
little  fingers,  while  a  third  boy  acting  as  a  sort  of  priest  —  an  elder 
of  the  gang  —  would  raise  his  hand  and  strike  the  link,  shouting, 
"  Partners,  partners,  never  break !  "     This  ritual  was  a  symbol  of  the 


ENVIRONMENTAL  BASIS  OF  CHARACTER     35 

members  of  the  gang  are  always  quarreling  with  each 
other,  but  here,  as  in  the  larger  aggregations  of  older 
human  beings,  "politics  ends  at  the  border,"  and  the 
gang  is  a  unit  against  foreign  aggression.  Indeed, 
gangs  of  a  neighborhood  may  league  against  a  group  of 
other  gangs,  as  did  the  quarreling  cities  of  Greece 
against  Persia. 

For  the  student  of  mankind  the  gang  is  one  of  the 
most  fascinating  phenomena.  Here  the  power  of  tradi- 
tion, without  the  aid  of  records,  is  seen.  Throughout 
America,  in  a  mysterious  way,  all  the  boys  start  spin- 
ning tops  at  a  certain  season  and  then  suddenly  cease 
and  begin  to  play  marbles.  Without  any  standardiza- 
tion of  a  central  type  they  have  the  same  rules  for  their 
games,  call  them  by  the  same  names  and  use  in  their 
songs  the  same  rhymes  and  airs.  Every  generation  of 
children  has  the  same  jokes  and  trick  games :  "  Eight 
and  eight  are  sixteen,  stick  your  nose  in  kerosene  " — 
"  A  dead  cat,  I  one  it,  you  two  it,  I  three  it,  you  four  it, 
I  five  it,  you  six  it,  I  seven  it,  you  eight  it!"  The  fact 
is,  of  course,  that  there  are  no  generations  as  distinct 
entities;  there  are  always  individuals  of  one  age,  and 
there  is  a  mutual  teaching  and  learning  going  on  at 
all  times,  which  is  the  basis  of  transmission  of  tradition. 
Children  are  usually  more  conservative  and  greater 
sticklers  for  form  and  propriety  than  even  men  are; 
only  now  and  then  a  freer  mind  arises  whose  courage 
and  pertinacity  change  things. 

Therefore,  in  the  understanding  of  character  the  in-  • 
fluence  of  the  environment  becomes  of  as  fundamental 

unity  of  the  pair,  so  that  they  fought  for  each  other,  shared  all  per- 
sonal goods  (such  as  candy,  pocket  money,  etc.,)  and  were  to  be  loyal 
and  sympathetic  throughout  life.  Alas,  dear  partner  of  my  boyhood, 
most  gallant  of  fighters  and  most  generous  of  souls,  where  are  you,  and 
where  is  our  friendship,  now? 


36     THE  FOUNDATIONS  OF  PERSONALITY 

importance  as  the  consideration  of  the  organic  make-up 
of  the  individual.  The  environment  in  the  form  of  tra- 
dition, social  ideal,  social  status,  economic  situation, 
race,  religion,  family,  education  is  thus  on  the  one  hand 
the  directing,  guiding,  eliciting  factor  in  character  and 
on  the  other  is  the  repressing,  inhibiting,  limiting 
factor. 

Putting  the  whole  thing  in  another  way :  the  organism 
is  the  Microcosmos,  or  little  world,  in  which  the  poten- 
tialities of  character  are  elaborated  in  the  germ  plasm 
we  inherit  from  our  ancestors,  in  the  healthy  interaction 
of  brain  with  the  rest  of  the  body,  especially  the  internal 
glands.  The  outside  world  is  the  Macrocosmos,  or 
large  world,  and  includes  the  physical  conditions  of 
existence  (climate,  altitude,  plentiness  of  food,  access 
to  the  sea)  as  well  as  the  social  conditions  of  existence 
(state  of  culture  of  times  and  race  and  family).  The 
social  conditions  of  existence  are  of  especial  interest  in 
that  they  reach  back  ages  before  the  individual  was  bom 
so  that  the  lives,  thoughts,  ideals  of  the  dead  may  domi- 
nate the  character  of  the  living. 

This  macrocosmos  both  brings  to  light  and  stifles  the 
character  peculiarities  of  the  microcosmos  and  the 
character  of  no  man,  as  we  see  or  know  it,  ever  ex- 
presses in  any  complete  manner  his  innate  possibilities. 

The  question  arises:  What  is  the  basis  of  the  influ- 
ence of  the  social  heredity,  of  the  forces,  in  the  charac- 
ter of  the  person  bom  in  a  social  group?  Certain  as- 
pects of  this  we  must  deal  with  later,  in  order  to  keep 
to  a  unified  presentation  of  the  subject.  Other  aspects 
are  pertinently  to  be  discussed  now. 

The  link  that  binds  man  to  man  is  called  the  social 
instinct,  though  perhaps  it  would  be  better  to  call  it  the 
group  of  social  instincts.     The  link  is  one  of  feeling, 


ENVIRONMENTAL  BASIS  OF  CHARACTER     37 

primarily,  though  it  has  associated  with  it,  in  an  indis- 
soluble way,  purpose  and  action.  The  existence  of  the 
social  instinct  is  undisputed;  its  explanation  is  varied 
and  ranges  from  the  mystical  to  the  evolutionary.  For 
the  mystical  (which  crops  out  in  Bergson,  Butler  and 
even  in  Gal  ton),  the  unity  of  life  is  its  basis,  and  there 
is  a  sort  of  recognition  of  parts  formerly  united  but 
now  separate  individuals.  This  does  not  explain  hate, 
racial  and  individual.  The  evolutionary  aspect  has  re- 
ceived its  best  handling  in  recent  years  in  Trotter's 
"  The  Herd,"  where  the  social  instincts  are  traced  in 
their  relation  to  human  history.  One  writer  after 
another  has  placed  as  basic  in  social  instinct,  sympathy, 
imitation,  suggestibility  and  the  recognition  of  "  like- 
ness." These  are  merely  names  for  a  spreading  of 
emotion  from  one  member  of  a  group  to  another,  for  a 
something  that  makes  members  of  the  group  teachable 
and  makes  them  wish  to  teach ;  that  is  back  of  the  wish 
to  conform  and  help  and  has  two  sets  of  guiding  forces, 
reward  and  its  derivative  praise;  punishment  and  its 
derivative  blame.  Perhaps  the  term  "  derivative  "  is 
not  correct,  and  perhaps  praise  and  blame  are  primary 
and  reward  and  punishment  secondary. 

So  eminent  a  philosopher  as  the  elder  Mill  declared 
"  the  distribution  of  praise  and  blame  is  the  greatest 
problem  of  society."  This  view  of  the  place  of  praise 
and  blame  in  the  organization  of  character  and  in  di- 
recting the  efforts  and  activity  of  men  is  hardly  exag- 
gerated. From  birth  to  death  the  pleasure  of  reward 
and  praise  and  the  pain  of  punishment  and  blame  are 
immensely  powerful  human  motives.  It  is  true  that 
now  and  then  individuals  seek  punishment  and  blame, 
but  this  is  always  to  win  the  favor  of  others  or 
of  the  most  important  observer  of  men's  actions,  —  God. 

126390 


38     THE  FOUNDATIONS  OF  PERSONALITY 

The  child  is  trained  through  the  effect  of  reward  and 
punishment,  praise  and  blame;  and  these  are  used  to 
set  up,  on  the  one  hand,  habits  of  conduct,  and  on  the 
other  an  inner  mentor  and  guide  called  Conscience. 
It  may  be  true  that  conscience  is  innate  in  its  poten- 
tialities, but  whether  that  is  so  or  not,  it  is  the  teaching 
and  training  of  the  times  or  of  some  group  that  gives 
to  conscience  its  peculiar  trend  in  any  individual  case. 
And  before  a  child  has  any  inward  mentor  it  depends 
for  its  knowledge  of  right  and  wrong  upon  the  efforts 
of  its  parents,  their  use  of  praise-reward  and  blame- 
punishment;  it  reacts  to  these  measures  in  accordance 
with  the  strength  and  vigor  of  its  social  instincts  and 
in  accordance  with  its  fear  of  punishment  and  desire 
for  reward.  The  feelings  of  duty  and  the  prickings  of 
conscience  serve  to  consolidate  a  structure  already 
formed. 

Here  we  must  discuss  a  matter  of  fundamental  im- 
portance in  character  analysis.  Men  are  not  born 
equal  in  any  respect.  This  inequality  extends  to  every 
power,  possibility  and  peculiarity  and  has  its  widest 
range  in  the  mental  and  character  life.  A  tall  man 
is  perhaps  a  foot  taller  than  a  very  short  man ;  a  giant 
is  perhaps  twice  as  tall  as  a  dwarf.  A  very  fleet  run- 
ner can  "  do "  a  hundred  yards  in  ten  seconds,  and 
there  are  few  except  the  crippled  or  aged  who  cannot 
run  the  distance  in  twenty  seconds.  Only  in  the  fables 
has  the  hero  the  strength  of  a  dozen  men.  But  where 
dexterity  or  knowledge  enters  things  become  different, 
and  one  man  can  do  what  the  most  of  men  cannot  even 
prepare  to  do.  Where  abstract  thought  or  talent  or 
genius  is  involved  the  greatest  human  variability  is 
seen.  There  we  have  Pascals  who  are  mathematicians 
at   five  and   discoverers  at  sixteen;  there   we   have 


ENVIRONMENTAL  BASIS  OF  CHARACTER     39 

Mozarts,  composers  at  three ;  there  we  have  our  inspired 
boy  preachers  already  consecrated  to  their  great  ideal 
of  work ;  and  we  have  also  our  Jesse  Pomeroys,  fiendish 
murderers  before  adolescence.  I  believe  with  Carlyle 
that  it  is  the  heroes,  the  geniuses  of  the  race,  to  whom 
we  owe  its  achievements;  and  the  hero  and  the  genius 
are  the  men  and  women  of  "  greatest  variability  "  in 
powers.  The  first  weapon,  the  starting  of  fire,  the  song 
that  became  "  a  folk  song  "  were  created  by  the  prehis- 
toric geniuses  and  became  the  social  heritage  of  the 
group  or  race.  And  "common  man"  did  little  to  de- 
velop religions  or  even  superstitions;  he  merely 
accepted  the  belief  of  a  leader. 

This  digression  is  to  emphasize  that  children  and  the 
men  and  women  they  grow  to  be  are  widely  variable 
in  their  native  social  feeling,  in  their  response  to  praise, 
blame,  reward  and  punishment.  One  child  eagerly  re- 
sponds to  all,  is  moved  by  praise,  loves  reward,  fears 
punishment  and  hates  blame.  Another  child  responds 
mainly  to  reward,  is  but  little  moved  by  praise,  fears 
punishment  and  laughs  at  blame.  Still  another  only 
fears  punishment,  while  there  is  a  type  of  deeply  anti- 
social nature  which  goes  his  own  way,  seeking  his  own 
egoistic  purposes,  uninfluenced  by  the  opinion  of  others, 
accepting  reward  cynically  and  fighting  against  pun- 
ishment. More  than  that,  each  child  shows  peculiari- 
ties in  the  types  of  praise,  reward,  blame  and  punish- 
ment that  move  him.  Some  children  need  corporal 
punishment  ^  and  others  who  are  made  rebels  by  it  are 
melted  into  conformity  by  ostracism. 

*  It  is  a  wishy-waahy  ideal  of  teaching  that  regards  pain  as  equivalent 
to  cruelty.  On  the  contrary,  it  may  be  real  cruelty  to  spare  pain, — 
cruelty  to  the  future  of  the  child.  Pain  is  a  great  teacher,  whether 
inflicted  by  the  knife  one  has  been  told  not  to  play  with,  or  by  the 
parent  when  the  injunction  not  to  play  with  the  knife  has  been  dis- 
regarded. 


40     THE  FOUNDATIONS  OF  PERSONALITY 

The  distribution  of  praise  and  blame  constitutes  the 
distribution  of  public  opinion.  Wherever  public  opin- 
ion is  free  to  exercise  its  power  it  is  a  weapon  of  extraor- 
dinary potency  before  which  almost  nothing  can  stand. 
One  might  define  a  free  nation  as  one  where  public 
opinion  has  no  limits,^  where  no  one  is  prevented  from 
the  expression  of  belief  about  the  action  of  others,  and 
no  one  is  exempted  from  the  pressure  of  opinion.  Con- 
versely an  autocracy  is  one  where  there  is  but  little 
room  for  the  public  use  of  praise  and  but  little  power 
to  blame,  especially  in  regard  to  the  rulers.  But  in  all 
societies,  whether  free  or  otherwise,  people  are  con- 
stantly praising,  constantly  blaming  one  another, 
whether  over  the  teacups  or  the  wine  glasses,  in  the 
sewing  circle  or  the  smoking  rooms,  in  the  midst  of 
families,  in  the  press,  in  the  great  halls  of  the  states 
and  nations.  These  are  "  the  mallets  "  by  which  society 
beats  or  attempts  to  beat  individuals  into  the  accepted 
shape. 

Men  and  women  and  children  all  strive  to  be  praised, 
if  not  by  their  own  group,  by  some  other  group  or  by 
some  generation.  It  is,  therefore,  a  high  achievement  to 
introduce  a  new  ideal  of  character  and  personality  to 
the  group.  Men  —  whose  opinion  as  to  desirability 
and  praiseworthiness  has  been  the  prepotent  opinion 
—  love  best  of  all  beauty  in  woman.  Therefore,  the  ideal 
of  beauty  as  an  achievement  is  a  leading  factor  in  the 
character  formation  of  most  girls  and  young  women. 
The  first  question  girls  ask  about  one  another  is,  "  Is 
she  pretty?  "  and  in  their  criticism  of  one  another  the 
personal  appearance  is  the  first  and  most  important 

*In  fact,  Oliver  Wendell  Holmes  has  defined  as  the  great  object  of 
human  society  the  free  growth  and  expression  of  human  thought.  How 
far  we  are  from  that  ideal! 


ENVIKONMENTAL  BASIS  OF  CHARACTER     41 

subject  discussed.  A  personal  beauty  ideal  has  little 
value  to  the  character;  in  fact,  it  tends  to  exaggerate 
vanity  and  triviality  and  selfishness ;  it  leads  away  from 
the  higher  aspects  of  reality.  If  you  ask  the  majority 
of  women  which  would  they  rather  be,  very  beautiful 
or  very  intelligent,  most  will  say  without  question  (in 
their  frank  moments)  that  they  would  rather  be  very 
beautiful.  Those  who  are  attempting  to  introduce  the 
ideal  of  intelligence  as  a  goal  to  women  need  of  course 
to  balance  it  with  other  ideals,  but  if  successful  they 
will  revolutionize  the  attitude  of  women  toward  life 
and  change  the  trend  of  their  character. 

Such  ideals  as  beauty  and  wealth,  however,  do  not 
acquire  their  imperativeness  unless  at  the  same  time 
they  gratify  some  deep-seated  group  of  desires  or  in- 
stincts. Wealth  gives  too  many  things  to  catalogue 
here,  but  fundamentally  it  gives  power,  and  so  beauty 
which  may  lead  to  wealth  is  always  a  source  of  power, 
although  this  power  carries  with  it  danger  to  the  owner. 
Mankind  has  been  praising  unselfishness  for  thousands 
of  years,  and  all  men  hate  to  be  called  selfish,  but  sel- 
fishness still  rules  in  the  lives  of  most  of  the  people 
of  the  world.  Chastity  and  continence  receive  the 
praise  of  the  religious  of  the  world,  as  well  as  of  the 
ascetic-minded  of  all  types,  yet  the  majority  of  men,  in 
theory  accepting  this  ideal,  reject  it  in  practice.  Sel- 
fishness leads  to  self-gratification  and  pleasure;  chas- 
tity imposes  a  burden  on  desire,  and  praise  and  blame 
are  in  this  instance  not  powerful  enough  to  control 
mankind's  acts,  though  powerful  enough  to  influence 
them.  Wherever  social  pressure  and  education  influ- 
ence men  and  women  to  conduct  which  is  contrary  to 
the  gratification  of  fundamental  desires,  it  causes  an 
uneasiness,  an  unhappiness  and  discomfort  upon  which 


42     THE  FOUNDATIONS  OF  PERSONALITY 

Graham  Wallas  ^  has  laid  great  stress  as  the  balked 
desire.  The  history  of  man  is  made  up  of  the  struggle 
of  normal  instincts,  emotions  and  purposes  against  the 
mistaken  inhibitions  and  prohibitions,  against  mistaken 
praise  and  blame,  reward  and  punishment.  Moral 
and  ethical  ideals  develop  institutions,  and  these  often 
press  too  heavily  upon  the  life  and  activities  of  those 
who  accept  them  as  authoritative. 

We  have  spoken  as  if  praise  and  blame  invariably 
had  the  same  results.  On  the  contrary,  though  in  gen- 
eral they  tend  to  bring  about  uniformity  and  conform- 
ity, people  vary  remarkably  from  one  another  in  their 
reaction  and  the  same  person  is  not  uniform  in  his  re- 
actions. The  reaction  to  praise  is  on  the  whole  an 
increased  happiness  and  vigor,  but  of  course  it  may, 
when  undeserved,  demoralize  the  character  and  lead 
to  a  foolish  vanity  and  to  inefiSiciency.  To  those  whose 
conscience  is  highly  developed,  undeserved  praise  is 
painful  in  that  it  leads  to  a  feeling  that  one  is  deceiving 
others.  Speaking  broadly,  this  is  a  rare  reaction.  Most 
people  accept  praise  as  their  due,  just  as  they  attribute 
success  to  their  merits.^  The  reaction  to  blame  may 
be  anger,  if  the  blame  is  felt  to  be  undeserved,  and 
there  are  people  of  irritable  ego  who  respond  in  this 
way  to  all  blame  or  even  the  hint  of  adverse  criticism. 
The  reaction  may  be  humiliation  and  lowered  self- 
valuation,  greatly  deenergizing  the  character  and  low- 

*  See  his  book  "  The  Great  Society "  for  a  fine  discussion  of  this  im- 
portant matter. 

'A  very  striking  example  of  this  was  noticeable  during  the  Great 
War.  American  business  men  in  general,  producers,  distributors, 
wholesalers,  retailers  and  speculators  all  got  "  rich,"  —  some  in  extraor- 
dinary measure.  Did  many  of  them  attribute  this  to  the  fact  that 
there  was  a  "  sellers'  market "  caused  by  the  conditions  over  which 
the  individual  business  man  had  no  control?  On  the  contrary,  the 
overwhelming  majority  quite  complacently  attributed  the  success 
(which  later  proved  ephemeral)  to  their  own  ability. 


ENVIRONMENTAL  BASIS  OF  CHARACTER     43 

ering  efftciency.  There,  again,  though  this  reaction 
occurs  in  some  degree  to  all,  others  are  so  constituted 
that  all  criticism  or  blame  is  extremely  painful  and 
needs  to  be  tempered  with  praise  and  encouragement. 
Where  blame  is  felt  to  be  deserved,  and  where  the  char- 
acter is  one  of  striving  after  betterment,  where  the  ego 
is  neither  irritable  nor  tender,  blame  is  an  aid  to  growth 
and  efficiency.  Many  a  man  flares  up  under  blame  who 
"  cools  "  down  when  he  sees  the  justice  of  the  criticism, 
and  changes  accordingly. 

Therefore,  in  estimating  the  character  of  any  indi- 
vidual, one  must  ask  into  the  nature  of  his  environment, 
the  traits  and  teachings  of  the  group  from  which  he 
comes  and  among  whom  he  has  lived.  To  understand 
any  one  this  inquiry  must  be  detailed  and  reach  back 
into  his  early  life.  Yet  not  too  much  stress  must  be 
laid  upon  certain  influences  in  regard  to  certain  quali- 
ties. For  example,  the  average  child  is  not  influenced 
greatly  by  immorality  until  near  puberty,  but  dishon- 
esty and  bad  manners  strike  at  him  from  early  child- 
hood. The  large  group,  the  small  group,  family  life, 
gang  life  influence  character,  but  not  necessarily  in  a 
direct  way.  They  may  act  to  develop  counter- 
prejudices,  for  there  is  no  one  so  bitter  against  alco- 
holism as  the  man  whose  father  was  a  drunkard  and 
who  himself  revolts  against  it.  And  there  is  no  one 
so  radical  as  he  whose  youth  was  cramped  by  too  much 
conservatism. 

One  might  easily  classify  people  according  to  their 
reaction  to  reward,  praise,  punishment  and  blame. 
This  would  lead  us  too  far  afield.  But  at  least  it  is 
safe  to  say  that  in  using  these  factors  in  directing  con- 
duct and  character  the  individual  must  be  studied  in  a 
detailed  way.     The  average  child,  the  average  man  and 


44     THE  FOUNDATIONS  OF  PERSONALITY 

woman  is  found  only  in  statistics.    Everywhere,  to  deal 
successfully,  one  must  deal  with  the  individual. 

There  is  a  praise-reacting  type  to  whom  praise  acts 
as  a  tonic  of  incomparable  worth,  especially  when  he 
who  administers  the  praise  is  respected.  And  there 
are  employers,  teachers  and  parents  who  ignore  this 
fact  entirely,  who  use  praise  too  little  or  not  at  all  and 
who  rely  on  adverse  criticism.  The  hunger  for  appre- 
ciation is  a  deep,  intense  need,  and  many  of  the  prob- 
lems of  life  would  melt  before  the  proper  use  of  praise. 

"  Fine  words  butter  no  parsnips  "  means  that  reward 
of  other  kinds  is  needed  to  give  substance  to  praise. 
Praise  only  without  reward  los|es  its  value.  "  I  get 
lots  of  *  Thank  you's '  and  *  You  are  a  good  fellow,' " 
complained  a  porter  to  me  once,  "  but  I  cannot  bring 
up  my  family  on  them."  In  their  hearts,  no  matter 
what  they  say,  the  majority  of  people  place  highly  him 
who  is  just  in  compensation  and  reward  and  they  want 
substantial  goods.  Many  a  young  scientist  of  my  ac- 
quaintance has  found  that  election  to  learned  societies 
and  praise  and  respect  palled  on  him  as  compared  to 
a  living  salary.  Money  can  be  exchanged  for  vacations, 
education,  books,  good  times  and  the  opportunity  of 
helping  others,  but  praise  has  no  cash  exchange  value. 

Blame  and  punishment  are  intensely  individual  mat- 
ters. Where  they  are  used  to  correct  and  to  better  the 
character,  where  they  are  the  tools  of  the  friends  and 
teacher  and  not  the  weapons  of  the  enemy,  great  care 
must  be  used.  Character  building  is  an  aim,  not  a 
technique,  and  the  end  has  justified  the  means.  Society 
has  just  about  come  to  the  conclusion  that  merely  pun- 
ishing the  criminal  does  not  reform  him,  and  merely 
to  punish  tfie  child  has  but  part  of  the  effect  desired. 
In  character  training  punishment  and  blame  must  bring 


ENVIRONMENTAL  BASIS  OF  CHARACTER     45 

pain,  but  that  pain  must  be  felt  to  be  deserved  (at  least 
in  the  older  child  and  adult)  and  not  arouse  lasting 
anger  or  humiliation.  It  must  teach  the  error  of  the 
ways  and  prepare  the  recipient  for  instruction  as  to 
the  right  away.  Often  enough  the  pain  of  punishment 
and  blame  widens  the  breach  between  the  teacher  and 
pupil  merely  because  the  former  has  inflicted  pain  with- 
out recompense. 

One  might  put  it  thus:  The  pleasure  of  praise  and 
reward  must  energize,  the  pain  of  blame  and  punish- 
ment must  teach,  else  teacher  and  society  have  misused 
these  social  tools. 

"  Very  well,"  I  hear  some  readers  say,  "  is  conscience 
to  be  dismissed  so  shortly?  Have  not  men  dared  to 
do  right  in  the  face  of  a  world  that  blamed  and  pun- 
ished; have  they  not  stood  without  praise  or  reward 
or  the  fellowship  of  others  for  the  actions  their  con- 
science dictated?  " 

Yes,  indeed.  What,  then,  is  conscience?  For  the 
common  thought  of  the  world  it  is  an  inward  mentor 
placed  by  God  within  the  bosom  of  man  to  guide  him, 
to  goad  him,  even,  into  choosing  right  and  avoiding 
wrong.  Where  the  conception  of  conscience  is  not 
quite  so  literal  and  direct  it  is  held  to  be  an  immanent 
something  of  innate  origin.  Whatever  it  may  be,  it 
surely  does  not  guide  us  very  accurately  or  well,  for 
there  are  opposing  consciences  on  every  side  of  every 
question,  and  opponents  find  themselves  equally  spurred 
by  conscience  to  action  and  are  equally  convinced  of 
righteousness.  In  the  long  run  it  would  be  difficult  to 
decide  which  did  more  harm  in  the  world,  a  conscien- 
tious persecutor  or  bigot,  an  Alvarez  or  James  the  First, 
or  a  dissolute,  conscienceless  sensualist  like  Charles  the 


46     THE  FOUNDATIONS  OF  PERSONALITY 

Second.  Certainly  consciences  differ  as  widely  as  di- 
gestions. 

Conscience,  so  it  seems  to  me,  arises  in  early  child- 
hood with  the  appearance  of  fixed  purposes.  It  is  en- 
tirely guided  at  first  by  teaching  and  by  praise  and 
blame,  for  the  infant  gives  no  evidence  of  conscience. 
But  the  infant  (or  young  child)  soon  wants  to  please, 
wants  the  favor  and  smiles  of  its  parents.  Why  does  it 
wish  to  please?  Is  there  a  something  irreducible  in  the 
desire?     I  do  not  know  and  cannot  pretend  to  answer. 

This,  however,  may  be  definitely  stated.  Conscience 
arises  or  grows  in  the  struggle  between  opposing  desires 
and  purposes  in  the  course  of  which  one  purpose  be- 
comes recognized  as  the  proper  guide  to  conduct.  Let 
us  take  a  simple  case  from  the  moral  struggles  of  the 
child. 

A  three-year-old,  wandering  into  the  kitchen,  with 
mother  in  the  back  yard  hanging  out  the  clothes,  makes 
the  startling  discovery  that  there  is  a  pan  of  tarts, 
apple  tarts,  on  the  kitchen  table,  easily  within  reach, 
especially  if  Master  Three-Year-Old  pulls  up  a  chair. 
Tarts!  The  child  becomes  excited,  his  mouth  waters, 
and  those  tarts  become  the  symbol  and  substance  of 
pleasure, —  and  within  his  reach.  But  in  the  back  of  his 
mind,  urging  him  to  stop  and  consider,  is  the  mem- 
ory of  mother's  injunction,  "  You  must  always  ask  for 
tarts  or  candy  or  any  goodies  before  you  take  them." 
And  there  is  the  pain  of  punishment  and  scolding  and 
the  vision  of  father,  looking  stem  and  not  playing  with 
one.  These  are  distant,  faint  memories,  weak  forces, — 
but  they  influence  conduct  so  that  the  little  one  takes  a 
tart  and  eats  it  hurriedly  before  mother  returns  and 
then  runs  into  the  dining  room  or  bedroom.  Thus, 
instead  of  merely  obeying  an  impulse  to  take  the  tart, 


ENVIRONMENTAL  BASIS  OF  CHARACTER     47 

as  an  uninstnicted  child  would,  he  has  now  become  a 
little  thief  and  has  had  his  first  real  moral  struggle. 

But  it  is  a  grim  law  that  sensual  pleasures  do  not 
last  beyond  the  period  of  gratification.  If  this  wei*e 
not  so  there  could  be  no  morality  in  the  world,  and  con- 
science would  never  reach  any  importance.  Whether 
we  gratify  sex  appetite  or  gastric  hunger,  the  pleasure 
goes  at  once.  True,  there  may  be  a  short  afterglow  of 
good  feeling,  but  rarely  is  it  strongly  affective,  and 
very  often  it  is  replaced  by  a  positive  repulsion  for  the 
appetite.  On  the  other  hand,  to  be  out  of  conformity 
with  your  group  is  a  permanent  pain,  and  the  fear  of 
being  found  out  is  an  anxiety  often  too  great  to  be 
endured.  And  so  our  child,  with  the  tart  gone,  wishes 
he  had  not  taken  it,  perhaps  not  clearly  or  verbally ;  he 
is  regretful,  let  us  say.  Out  of  this  regret,  out  of  this 
fear  of  being  found  out,  out  of  the  pain  of  nonconform- 
ity, arises  the  conscience  feeling  which  says,  "  Thou 
shalt  not "  or  "  Thou  shalt,"  according  to  social 
teaching. 

It  may  be  objected  that  "  Conscience  often  arrays  it- 
self against  society,  against  social  teaching,  against 
perhaps  all  men."  It  is  not  my  place  to  trace  the  growth 
in  mind  of  the  idea  of  the  Absolute  Good,  or  absolute 
right  and  wrong,  with  which  a  man  must  align  himself. 
I  believe  it  is  the  strength  of  the  ego  feeling  which 
gives  to  some  the  vigor  and  unyieldingness  of  their 
conscience.  "  I  am  right,"  says  such  a  person,  "  and 
the  rest  of  the  world  is  wrong.  God  is  with  me,  my 
conscience  and  future  times  will  agree,"  thus  appealing 
to  the  distant  tribunal  as  James  pointed  out.  All  the 
insane  hospitals  have  their  sufferers  for  conscience's 
sake,  paranoid  personalities  whose  egos  have  expanded 


48     THE  FOUNDATIONS  OF  PERSONALITY 

to  infallibility  and  whose  consciences  are  correspond- 
ingly developed. 

Conscience  thus  represents  the  power  of  the  perma- 
nent purposes  and  ideals  of  the  individuals,  and  it  wars 
on  the  less  permanent  desires  and  impulses,  because 
there  is  in  memory  the  uneasiness  and  anxiety  that  re- 
sulted from  indulgence  and  the  pain  of  the  feeling  of 
inferiority  that  results  when  one  is  hiding  a  secret 
weakness  or  undergoing  reproof  or  punishment.  This 
group  of  permanent  purposes,  ideals  and  aspirations 
corresponds  closely  to  the  censor  of  the  Freudian  con- 
cept and  here  is  an  example  where  a  new  name  suc- 
cessfully disguises  an  age-old  thought. 

In  other  words,  conscience  is  social  in  its  origin,  de- 
veloping differently  in  different  people  according  to 
their  teaching,  intelligence,  will,  ego-feeling,  instincts, 
etc.  From  the  standpoint  of  character  analysis  there 
are  many  types  of  people  in  regard  to  conscience  devel- 
opment. 

In  respect  to  the  reactions  to  praise  and  blame  the  fol- 
lowing types  are  conspicuous : 

1.  A  "  weak  "  group  in  whom  these  act  as  apparently 
the  sole  motives. 

2.  A  group  energized  by  love  of  praise. 

3.  A  group  energized  mainly  by  fear  of  blame. 

4.  A  type  that  scorns  anything  but  material  reward. 

5.  Another,  that  "  takes  advantage  "  of  reward ;  likes 
praise  but  is  merely  made  conceited  by  it,  hates  blame 
but  is  merely  made  angry  by  it,  fears  punishment  and 
finds  its  main  goad  to  good  conduct  in  this  fear. 

6.  Then  there  are  those  in  whom  all  these  motives 
operate  in  greater  or  lesser  degree,  —  the  so-called  nor- 
mal person.  In  reality  he  has  his  special  inclinations 
and  dreads. 


ENVIRONMENTAL  BASIS  OF  CHARACTER     49 

7.  The  majority  of  people  are  influenced  mainly  by 
the  group  with  which  they  have  cast  their  positions,  the 
blame  of  others  being  relatively  unimportant  or  arous- 
ing anger.  For  there  is  this  great  difference  between 
our  reactions  to  praise  and  blame:  that  while  the 
praise  of  almost  any  one  and  for  almost  any  quality 
is  welcome,  the  blame  of  only  a  few  is  taken  "  well," 
and  for  the  rest  there  is  anger,  contempt  or  defiance. 
The  influence  of  blame  varies  with  the  respect,  love  and 
especially  acknowledged  superiority  of  the  blamer. 
The  "  boss  "  has  a  right  to  blame  and  so  has  father 
or  mother  while  we  are  children,  but  we  resent  bitterly 
the  blame  of  a  fellow  employee ;  "  he  has  no  right  to 
blame,"  and  we  rebel  against  the  blame  of  our  parents 
when  we  grow  up.  In  fact,  the  war  of  the  old  and  new 
generations  starts  with  the  criticism  of  the  elder  folk 
and  the  resentment  of  the  younger  folk. 

It  will  be  seen  that  reaction  to  praise  and  blame,  etc., 
will  depend  upon  the  irritability  of  ego  feeling,  the  love 
of  superiority  and  the  dislike  for  inferiority.  This 
basic  situation  we  must  defer  discussing,  but  what  is 
of  importance  is  that  the  primitive  disciplinary  weap- 
ons we  have  discussed  never  lose  their  cardinal  value 
and  remain  throughout  life  and  in  all  societies  the  prime 
modes  of  thought  and  conduct. 

In  similar  fashion  the  conscience  types  might  be  de- 
picted. From  the  over-conscientious  who  rigidly  hold 
themselves  to  an  ideal,  who  watch  every  departure  from 
perfection  with  agony  and  self-reproach,  and  who  may 
either  reach  the  highest  level  or  "  break  down  "  and 
become  inefficient  to  the  almost  conscienceless  group, 
doing  only  what  seems  more  profitable,  are  many  inter- 
mediate types  merging  one  with  the  other. 

There  are  people  whose  conscience  is  localized,  as  the 


50     THE  FOUNDATIONS  OF  PERSONALITY 

self-sacrificing  father  who  is  a  pirate  in  business,  or  as 
the  policeman  who  holds  rigidly  to  conscience  in  courage 
and  loyalty  to  his  fellows,  but  who  finds  no  internal 
reproach  when  he  takes  a  bribe  or  perjures  himself 
about  a  criminal.  What  we  call  a  code  is  really  a  local- 
ized conscience,  and  there  are  many  men  whose  con- 
sciences do  not  permit  seduction  of  the  virgin  but  who 
are  quite  easy  in  mind  about  an  intrigue  with  a  married 
woman.  So,  too,  you  may  be  as  wily  as  you  please  in 
business  but  find  cheating  at  cards  base  and  unthink- 
able. Conscience  in  the  abstract  may  be  a  divine  en- 
tity, but  in  the  realities  of  everyday  life  it  is  a  medley 
of  motives,  purposes  and  teachings,  varying  from  the 
grotesque  and  mischief-working  to  the  sublime  and 
splendid. 


CHAPTER  III 

MEMORY  AND  HABIT 

There  are  two  qualities  of  nervous  tissues  (possibly 
of  all  living  tissue)  that  are  basic  in  all  nervous  and 
mental  processes.  They  are  dependent  upon  the  modi- 
ficability  of  nerve  cells  and  fibers  by  stimuli,  e.  g.,  a  light 
flashing  through  the  pupil  and  passing  along  the  optical 
tracts  to  the  occipital  cortex  produces  changes  which 
constitute  the  basis  of  visual  memory.  Experience 
modifies  nervous  tissue  in  definite  manner,  and  some- 
thing remembers.  Who  remembers?  Who  is  con- 
scious? Believe  what  you  please  about  that,  call  it 
ego,  soul,  call  it  consciousness  dipped  out  of  a  cosmic 
consciousness ;  and  I  have  no  quarrel  with  you. 

Memory  has  its  mechanics,  in  the  association  of  ideas, 
which  preoccupied  the  early  English  psychologists  and 
philosophers;  it  is  the  basis  of  thought  and  also  of  ac- 
tion, and  it  is  a  prime  mystery.  We  know  its  pa- 
thology, we  think  that  memories  for  speech  have  loci  in 
the  brain,  the  so-called  motor  memories  in  Broca's 
apea.^  We  know  that  a  hemorrhage  in  these  areas  or 
in  the  fibers  passing  from  them,  or  a  tumor  pressing  on 
them  may  destroy  or  temporarily  abolish  these  mem- 
ories, so  that  a  man  may  know  what  he  wishes  to  say, 
understand  speech  and  be  unable  to  say  it,  though  he 
may  write  it  (motor  aphasia).  In  sensory  aphasia 
the  defect  is  a  loss  of  the  capacity  to  understand  spoken 

*  Foot  of  the  left  or  right  third  frontal  convolutiong,  auditory  speech 
in  the  supramarginal,  etc. 


52     THE  FOUNDATIONS  OF  PERSONALITY 

speech,  though  the  patient  may  be  able  to  say  what  he 
himself  wishes.  ( It  is  fair  to  say  that  the  definite  loca- 
tion of  these  capacities  in  definite  areas  has  been  chal- 
lenged by  Marie,  Moutier  and  others,  but  this  denial 
does  not  deny  the  organic  brain  location  of  speech  mem- 
ories; it  merely  afiSrms  that  they  are  scattered  rather 
than  concentrated  in  one  area.) 

In  its  widest  phases  memory  alters  with  the  state  of 
the  brain.  In  childhood  impressibility  is  high,  but  until 
the  age  or  four  or  five  the  duration  of  impression  is 
low,  and  likewise  the  power  of  voluntary  recall.  In 
youth  (eighteen- twenty)  all  these  capacities  are  per- 
haps at  their  highest.  As  time  goes  on  impressibility 
seems  first  of  all  to  be  lost,  so  that  it  becomes  harder 
and  harder  to  learn  new  things,  to  remember  new 
faces,  new  names. 

The  typical  difficulty  of  middle  age  is  to  remember 
names,  because  these  have  no  real  relationship  or  logical 
value  and  must  be  arbitrarily  remembered.  The  typi- 
cal senile  defect  is  the  dropping  out  of  the  recent  mem- 
ories, though  the  past  may  be  preserved  in  its  entirety. 
With  any  disease  of  the  brain,  temporary  or  permanent, 
amnesia  or  memory  loss  may  and  usually  is  present 
(e.  g.,  general  paresis,  tumor,  cerebral  arteriosclerosis, 
etc.).  As  the  result  of  Carbon  monoxide  poisoning,  as 
after  accidental  or  attempted  suicidal  gas  inhalation, 
the  memory,  especially  for  the  most  recent  events,  is 
impaired  and  the  patient  cannot  remember  the  events 
as  they  occur ;  he  passes  from  moment  to  moment  uncon- 
nected to  the  recent  past,  though  his  remote  past  is 
clear.  Since  memory  is  the  basis  of  certainty,  of  the 
feeling  of  reality,  these  unfortunates  are  afflicted  with 
an  uncertainty,  a  sense  of  unreality,  that  is  almost  agon- 
izing.    As  the  effects  of  the  poison  wear  off,  which  even 


MEMORY  AND  HABIT  53 

in  favorable  cases  takes  months,  the  impressibility  re- 
turns but  never  reaches  normality  again. 

Unquestionably  there  is  an  inherent  congenital  dif- 
ference in  memory  capacity.  There  are  people  who  are 
prodigies  of  memory  as  there  are  those  who  are  prodi- 
gies of  physical  strength, — and  without  training.  The 
impressibility  for  memories  can  in  no  way  be  increased 
except  through  the  stimulation  of  interest  and  a  cer- 
tain heightening  of  attention  through  emotion.  For  the 
man  or  woman  concerned  with  memory  the  first  point 
of  importance  is  to  find  some  value  in  the  fact  or  thing 
to  be  learned.  Before  a  subject  is  broached  to  students 
the  teacher  should  make  clear  its  practical  and  theo- 
retic value  to  the  students.  Too  often  that  is  the 
last  thing  done  and  it  is  only  when  the  course  is  fin- 
ished that  its  practical  meaning  is  stressed  or  even  indi- 
cated. In  fact,  throughout,  teaching  the  value  of  the 
subject  should  constantly  be  emphasized,  if  possible,  by 
illustrations  from  life.  There  are  only  a  few  who  love 
knowledge  for  its  own  sake,  but  there  are  many  who 
become  eager  for  learning  when  it  is  made  practical. 

The  number  of  associations  given  to  a  fact  determines 
to  a  large  extent  its  permanence  in  memory  and  the 
power  of  recalling  it.  In  my  own  teaching  I  always 
instruct  my  students  in  the  technique  of  memorizing, 
as  follows : 

1.  Listen  attentively,  making  only  as  many  notes  as 
necessary  to  recall  the  leading  facts.  The  auditory 
memories  are  thus  given  the  first  place. 

2.  Go  home  and  read  up  the  subject  in  your  text- 
books, again  making  notes.  Thus  is  added  the  visual 
associations. 

3.  Write  out  in  brief  form  the  substance  of  the  lec- 
ture, deriving  your  knowledge  from  both  the  lecture  and 


54     THE  FOUNDATIONS  OF  PERSONALITY 

the  book.    You  thus  add  another  set  of  associations  to 
your  memories  of  the  subject. 

4.  Teach  the  subject  to  or  discuss  it  with  a  fellow 
student.  By  this  you  vitalize  the  memories  you  have, 
you  link  them  firmly  together,  you  lend  to  them  the 
ardor  of  usefulness  and  of  victory.  You  are  forced  to 
realize  where  the  gaps,  the  lacunw  of  your  knowledge 
come,  and  are  made  to  fill  them  in. 

Thus  the  best  way  to  remember  a  fact  is  to  find  a 
use  for  it  and  to  link  it  to  your  interests  and  your  pur- 
poses. Unrelated  it  has  no  value;  related  it  becomes 
in  fact  a  part  of  you.  After  that  the  mechanics  of 
memory  necessitate  the  making  of  as  many  pathways 
to  that  fact  as  possible,  and  this  means  deliberately  to 
associate  the  fact  by  sound,  by  speech  and  by  action. 
The  advertised  schemes  of  memory  training  are  simply 
association  schemes,  old  as  the  hills,  and  having  value 
indeed,  but  too  much  is  claimed  for  them.  A  splendid 
memory  is  born,  not  made;  but  any  memory,  except 
where  disease  has  entered,  can  be  improved  by  training. 

It  is  because  lectures  on  the  whole  do  not  supply 
enough  associations  or  arouse  enough  interest  that  the 
lecture  is  the  poorest  method  of  teaching  or  learning. 
Man's  mind  sticks  easily  to  things,  but  with  difficulty 
to  words  about  things.  To  maintain  attention  for  an 
hour  or  so,  while  sitting,  is  a  task,  and  there  develops 
a  tendency  either  to  a  hypnoidal  state  in  which  the 
mind  follows  uncritically,  or  to  a  restless  uneasiness 
with  wandering  mind  and  fatigue  of  body.  A  demon- 
stration, on  the  other  hand,  a  laboratory  experiment 
with  short,  personal  instruction,  a  bodily  contact  with 
the  problem  calls  into  play  interest,  enthusiasm,  curi- 
osity, motor  images,  the  use  of  the  hands,  and  is  the 
method  of  teaching. 


MEMORY  AND  HABIT  55 

There  are  at  present  excellent  psychological  methods 
of  testing  out  the  memory  capacity.  Every  one  en- 
gaged in  any  responsible  work,  or  troubled  about  his 
memory,  should  be  so  tested.  While  there  are  other 
qualities  of  mind  of  great  importance,  memory  is  basic, 
and  no  one  can  really  understand  himself  who  is  in 
doubt  about  his  memory.  In  such  diseases  as  neuras- 
thenia one  of  the  commonest  complaints  is  the  "  loss  of 
memory,"  which  greatly  troubles  the  patient.  As  a 
matter  of  fact,  what  is  impaired  is  interest  and  atten- 
tion, and  when  the  patient  realizes  this  he  is  usually 
quite  relieved.  The  man  who  has  a  poor  memory  may 
become  very  successful  if  he  develops  systems  of  record- 
ing, filing,  indexing,  but  his  possibilities  of  knowledge 
are  greatly  reduced  by  his  defect.^ 

A  second  fundamental  ability  of  living  tissue,  and  of 
particular  importance  in  character,  is  habit  formation. 
Habit  resides  in  the  fact  that  once  living  tissue  has 
been  traversed  by  a  stimulus  and  has  responded  by  an 
act,  three  things  result: 

1.  The  pathway  for  that  stimulus  becomes  more  per- 
meable; becomes,  as  it  were,  grooved  or  like  a  track 
laid  across  the  living  structure  of  the  nervous  system. 

2.  The  responding  element  is  more  easily  stirred  into 
activity,  responds  wdth  more  vigor  and  with  less  effort. 

3.  Consciousness,  at  first  invoked,  recedes  more  and 
more,  until  the  habit-action  of  whatever  type  tends  to 
become  automatic.  There  is  in  this  last  peculiarity 
a  tendency  for  the  habit  to  establish  itself  as  independ- 
ent of  the  personality,  and  if  an  injurious  or  undesired 

*  It  is  the  growth  of  the  subject  matter  of  knowledge  that  makes 
necessary  the  elaborate  systems  of  indexing,  etc.,  now  so  important. 
It  is  as  much  as  man  can  do  to  follow  the  places  where  the  men  work, 
let  alone  what  they  are  doing.  This  growth  of  knowledge  is  getting  to 
be  an  extra-human  phenomenon.  Of  this  Graham  Wallas  has  written 
entertainingly. 


56     THE  FOUNDATIONS  OF  PERSONALITY 

habit,  to  set  up  the  worst  of  the  conflicts  of  life, —  a  con- 
flict between  one's  intention  and  an  automaton  in  the 
shape  of  a  powerfully  entrenched  habit. 

Habits  are  economical  of  thought  and  energy,  gen- 
erally speaking ;  that  is  their  main  recommendation.  A 
dozen  examples  present  themselves  at  once  as  illustra- 
tive: piano  playing,  with  its  intense  concentration  on 
each  note,  with  consciousness  attending  to  the  action  of 
each  muscle,  and  then  practice,  habit  formation,  and 
the  ease  and  power  of  execution  with  the  mind  free  to 
wander  off  in  the  moods  suggested  by  the  music,  or  to 
busy  itself  with  improvisations,  flourishes  and  the  artis- 
tic touches.  Before  true  artistry  can  come,  technique 
must  be  relegated  to  habit.  So  with  typewriting,  driv- 
ing an  automobile,  etc. 

More  fundamental  than  these,  which  are  largely  skill 
habits,  are  the  organic  habits.  One  of  the  triumphs 
of  pediatrics  depends  upon  the  realization  that  the 
baby's  welfare  hangs  on  regular  habits  of  feeding,  that 
he  is  not  to  be  fed  except  at  stated  intervals ;  as  a  result 
processes  of  digestion  are  set  going  in  a  regular,  har- 
monious manner.  In  other  words,  these  processes  may 
be  said  to  "  get  to  know  "  what  is  expected  of  them  and 
act  accordingly.  The  mother's  time  is  economized  and 
the  strain  of  nursing  is  lessened.  In  adults,  regular 
hours  of  eating  make  it  possible  for  the  juices  of  diges- 
tion to  be  secreted  as  the  food  is  ingested;  in  other 
words,  an  habitual  adjustment  takes  place. 

If  there  were  one  single  health  habit  that  I  would 
have  inculcated  above  all  others,  it  would  be  the  habit 
of  regularly  evacuating  the  bowels.  While  constipa- 
tion is  not  the  worst  ill  in  the  world,  it  causes  much 
trouble,  annoyance  and  a  considerable  degree  of  ill 
health,  and,  in  my  opinion,  a  considerable  degree  of  un- 


MEMORY  AND  HABIT  57 

happiness.  A  physician  may  be  pardoned  for  frank 
advice:  all  the  matters  concerning  the  bowels,  such  as 
coarse  foods,  plenty  of  water  and  exercise,  are  secondary 
compared  to  the  habit  of  going  to  the  stool  at  the  same 
time  each  day,  whether  there  be  desire  or  not,  A  child 
should  be  trained  in  this  matter  as  definitely  as  he  is 
trained  to  brush  his  teeth.  In  fact,  I  think  that  the 
former  habit  is  more  important  than  the  latter.  The 
mood  of  man  is  remarkably  related  to  the  condition  of 
his  gastro-intestinal  tract  and  the  involuntary  muscle 
of  that  tract  is  indirectly  under  the  control  of  the  will 
through  habit  formation. 

Sleep  ^  the  mysterious,  the  death  in  life  which  we  all 
seek  each  night,  is  likewise  regulated  by  habit.  Arising 
from  the  need  of  relief  from  consciousness  and  bodily 
exertion,  the  mechanism  of  sleep  is  still  not  well  under- 
stood. Is  there  a  toxic  influence  at  work?  is  the  body 
poisoned  by  itself,  as  it  were,  as  has  been  postulated; 
is  there  a  toxin  of  fatigue,  or  is  there  a  "  vaso-motor  " 
reaction,  a  shift  of  the  blood  supply  causing  a  cerebral 
anaemia  and  thus  creating  the  "  sleepy  "  feeling?  The 
capacity  to  sleep  is  a  factor  of  great  importance  and  we 
shall  deal  with  it  later  under  a  separate  heading  as 
part  of  the  mechanism  of  success  and  failure.  At  pres- 
ent we  shall  simply  point  out  that  each  person  builds 
up  a  set  of  habits  regarding  sleep,  —  as  to  hour,  kind 
of  place,  warmth,  companionship,  ventilation  and  even 
the  side  of  the  body  he  shall  lie  on,  and  that  a  change 
in  these  preliminary  matters  is  often  attended  by  in- 
somnia. Moreover,  a  change  from  the  habitual  in  the 
general  conduct  of  life  —  a  new  city  or  town,  a  strange 
bed,  a  disturbance  in  the  moods  and  emotions  —  may 

^  As  good  a  book  as  any  on  the  subject  of  sleep  is  Boris  Sidis's  little 
monograph. 


58     THE  FOUNDATIONS  OF  PERSONALITY 

upset  the  sleep  capacity.  Those  in  whom  excitement 
persists,  or  whose  emotions  are  persistent,  become  easily 
burdened  with  the  dreaded  insomnia.  Sleep  is  depend- 
ent on  an  exclusion  of  excitement  and  exciting 
influences.  If,  however,  exciting  influences  become  ha- 
bitual they  lose  their  power  over  the  organism  and  then 
the  individual  can  sleep  on  a  battle  field,  in  a  boiler 
factory,  or  almost  anywhere.  Conversely,  many  a  New 
Yorker  is  lulled  to  sleep  by  the  roar  of  the  great  city 
who  finds  that  the  quiet  of  the  country  keeps  him 
awake. 

Sleeplessness  often  enough  is  a  habit.  Something 
happens  to  a  man  that  deeply  stirs  him,  as  an  insult, 
or  a  falling  out  with  a  friend,  or  the  loss  of  money, — 
something  which  disturbs  what  we  call  his  poise  or 
peace  of  mind.  He  becomes  sleepless  because,  when  he 
goes  to  bed  and  the  shock-absorbing  objects  of  daily 
interest  are  removed,  his  thoughts  revert  back  to  his 
difficulty;  he  becomes  again  humiliated  or  grieved  or 
thrown  into  an  emotional  turmoil  that  prevents  sleep. 
After  the  first  night  of  insomnia  a  new  factor  enters,  — 
the  fear  of  sleeplessness  and  the  conviction  that  one 
will  not  sleep.  After  a  time  the  insult  has  lost  its 
sting,  or  the  difficulty  has  been  adjusted,  there  is  no 
more  emotional  distress,  but  there  is  the  established 
sleeplessness,  based  on  habitual  emotional  reaction  to 
sleep.  I  know  one  lady  whose  fear  reached  the  stage 
where  she  could  not  even  bear  the  thought  of  night  and 
darkness.  It  is  in  these  cases  that  a  powerful  drug 
used  two  or  three  nights  in  succession  breaks  up  the 
sleepless  habit  and  reestablishes  the  power  to  sleep. 

People  differ  in  their  capacity  to  form  habits  and  in 
their  love  of  habits.  The  normal  habits,  thoroughness, 
neatness  and  method  come  easily  to  some  and  are  never 


MEMORY  AND  HABIT  59 

really  acquired  by  others.  People  of  an  impetuous, 
explosive  or  reckless  character,  keenly  alive  to  every 
shade  of  difference  in  things,  find  it  hard  to  be  methodi- 
cal, to  carry  on  routine.  The  impatient  person  has 
similar  difficulties.  Whereas  others  take  readily  to  the 
same  methods  of  doing  things  day  by  day ;  and  these  are 
usually  non-explosive,  well  inliibited,  patient  persons, 
to  whom  the  way  a  thing  is  done  is  as  important  as  the 
goal  itself. 

Here  comes  a  very  entertaining  problem,  the  ques- 
tion of  the  value  of  habits.  Good  habits  save  time  and 
energy,  tend  to  eliminate  useless  labor  and  make  for 
peace  and  quiet.  But  there  is  a  large  body  of  persons 
who  come  to  value  habits  for  themselves  and,  indeed, 
this  is  true  to  a  certain  extent  of  all  of  us.  Once  an 
accustomed  way  of  doing  things  is  established  it  be- 
comes not  only  a  path  of  least  resistance,  but  a  sort 
of  fixed  point  of  view,  and,  if  one  may  mix  metaphors  a 
trifle,  a  sort  of  trunk  for  the  ego  to  twine  itself  around. 
There  is  uneasiness  in  the  thought  of  breaking  up  habits, 
an  uneasiness  that  grows  the  more  as  we  become  older 
and  is  deepened  into  agony  if  the  habit  is  tinged  with 
our  status  in  life,  if  it  has  become  a  sort  of  measure  of 
our  respectability.  Thus  a  good  housekeeper  falls  into 
the  habits  of  doing  things  which  were  originally  a  mark 
of  her  ability,  which  she  holds  as  sacred  and  values 
above  her  health  and  energy.  There  are  people  who 
fiercely  resent  a  new  way  of  doing  things;  they  have 
woven  their  most  minor  habits  into  their  ego  feeling 
and  thus  make  a  personal  issue  of  innovations.  These 
are  the  upholders  of  the  established;  they  hate  change 
as  such;  they  are  efficient  but  not  progressive.  In  its 
pathological  form  this  type  becomes  the  "  health 
fiends  "  who  never  vary  in  their  diet  or  in  their  cloth- 


60     THE  FOUNDATIONS  OF  PERSONALITY 

ing,  who  arise  at  a  certain  time,  take  their  "  plunge  " 
regardless,  take  their  exercise  and  their  breakfasts 
alike  as  a  health  measure  without  real  enjoyment,  etc., 
who  grow  weary  if  they  stay  up  half  an  hour  or  so  be- 
yond their  ordinary  bedtime;  they  are  the  individuals 
who  fall  into  health  cults,  become  vegetarians,  raw  food 
exponents,  etc. 

Opposed  to  the  group  that  falls  into  habits  very  read- 
ily is  the  group  that  finds  it  difficult  to  acquire  habitual 
ways  of  working  and  living.  All  of  us  seek  change  and 
variety,  as  well  as  stability.  Some  cannot  easily  form 
habits  because  they  are  quickly  bored  by  the  habitual. 
These  restless  folk  are  the  failures  or  the  great  suc- 
cesses, according  to  their  intelligence  and  good  fortune. 
There  is  a  low-grade  intelligence  type,  without  purpose 
and  energy,  and  there  is  a  high-grade  intelligence  type, 
seeking  the  ideal,  restless  under  imperfection  and  re- 
straint, disdaining  the  commonplace  and  the  habits  that 
go  with  it.  Is  their  disdain  of  habit-forming  and  cus- 
toms the  result  of  their  unconventional  ways,  or  do 
their  unconventional  ways  result  because  they  cannot 
easily  form  habits?  It  is  very  probable  that  the  true 
wanderer  and  Bohemian  finds  it  difficult,  at  least  in 
youth,  to  form  habits,  and  that  the  pseudo-Bohemian 
is  merely  an  imitation. 

Habit  is  so  intimately  a  part  of  all  traits  and  abilities 
that  we  would  be  anticipating  several  chapters  of  this 
book  did  we  go  into  all  the  habit  types.  Social  condi- 
tions, desire,  fatigue,  monotony,  purpose,  intelligence, 
inhibition,  all  enter  into  habit  and  habit  formation. 
Youth  experiments  with  habit;  old  age  clings  to  it. 
Efficiency  is  the  result  of  good  habits  but  originality  is 
the  reward  of  some  who  discard  habits.  A  nation 
forms  habits  which  seem  to  be  part  of  its  nature,  until 


i  MEMORY  AND  HABIT  61 

emigration  to  another  land  shows  the  falsity  of  this 
belief.  So  with  individuals :  a  man  feels  he  must  eat  or 
drink  so  much,  gratify  his  sex  appetite  so  often,  sleep 
so  many  hours,  exercise  this  or  that  amount,  seek  his 
entertainment  in  this  or  that  fashion,  —  until  some- 
thing happens  to  make  the  habit  impossible  and  he  finds 
that  what  he  thought  a  deeply  rooted  mode  of  living 
was  a  superficial  routine.  Though  good  habits  may 
lead  to  success  they  may  also  bar  the  way  to  the  pleas- 
ures of  experience;  that  is  their  danger.  A  man  who 
finds  that  he  must  do  this  or  that  in  such  a  way  had 
better  beware;  he  is  getting  old,  no  matter  what  his 
age.^  For  we  grow  older  as  we  lose  mobility, — in 
joints,  muscles,  skin  and  our  ways  of  doing,  feeling  and 
thinking!  It  is  a  transitory  stage  of  the  final  immo- 
bility of  Death. 

We  have  not  considered  the  pathological  habits,  such 
as  alcoholism,  excessive  smoking  and  eating,  perverse 
sex  habits.  The  latter,  the  perverse  sex  habits,  will 
be  studied  when  discussing  the  sex  feelings  and  pur- 
poses in  their  entirety.  Alcoholism  is  not  yet  a  dead 
issue  in  this  country  though  those  who  are  sincere  in 
wishing  their  fellows  well  hope  it  soon  will  be.  It 
stands,  however,  as  a  sort  of  paradigm  of  bad  habit- 
forming  and  presents  a  problem  in  treatment  that  is 
typical  of  such  habits. 

Not  all  persons  have  a  liability  to  the  alcoholic  habit. 
For  most  people  lack  of  real  desire  or  pleasure  pre- 
vented alcoholism.  The  majority  of  those  who  drank 
little  or  not  at  all  were  not  in  the  least  tempted  by  the 

^  Says  the  talkative  Autocrat  of  the  Breakfast  Table :  "  There  is  one 
mark  of  age  that  strikes  me  more  than  any  of  the  physical  ones ;  I  mean 
the  formation  of  Habits.  An  old  man  who  shrinks  into  himself  falls 
into  ways  that  become  as  positive  and  as  much  beyond  the  reach  of 
outside  influences  as  if  they  were  governed  by  clock  work." 


62     THE  FOUNDATIONS  OF  PERSONALITY 

drug.  "  Will  power  "  rarely  had  anything  to  do  with 
their  abstinence  and  the  complacency  vnth  which  they 
held  themselves  up  as  an  example  to  the  drunken  had 
all  the  flavor  of  Phariseeism.  To  some  the  taste  is  not 
pleasing,  to  others  the  immediate  effects  are  so  terrify- 
ing as  automatically  to  shut  off  excess.  Many  people 
become  dizzy  or  nauseated  almost  at  once  and  even  lose 
the  power  of  locomotion  or  speech. 

In  many  countries  and  during  many  centuries  most 
of  those  who  became  alcoholic  were  such  largely 
through  the  social  setting  given  to  alcohol.  Because  of 
the  psychological  effects  of  this  drug  in  removing  re- 
straint, inhibition  and  formality,  in  its  various  forms  it 
became  the  symbol  of  good-fellowship;  and  because  it 
has  an  apparent  stimulation  and  heat-producing  effect 
there  grew  up  the  notion  that  it  aided  hard  labor  and 
helped  resist  hardship.  As  the  symbol  of  good-fellow- 
ship it  grew  into  a  tradition  of  the  most  binding  kind, 
so  that  no  good  time,  no  coming  together  was  complete 
without  it,  and  its  power  is  celebrated  in  picturesque 
songs  and  picturesque  sayings  the  world  over.  Hos- 
pitality, tolerance,  good  humor,  kindliness  and  the 
pleasant  breaking  down  of  the  barriers  between  man 
and  man,  and  also  between  man  and  woman,  all  these 
lured  generation  after  generation  into  the  alcoholic 
habit. 

There  are  relatively  normal  types  of  the  heavy 
drinker,  —  the  socially  minded  and  the  hard  manual 
worker.  But  there  is  a  large  group  of  those  who  find 
in  alcohol  a  relief  from  the  burden  of  their  moods,  who 
find  in  its  real  effect,  the  release  from  inhibitions,  a 
reason  for  drinking  beyond  the  reach  of  reason.  Do 
you  feel  that  the  endless  monotony  of  your  existence 
can  no  longer  be  borne,  —  drink  deep  and  you  color 


MEMORY  AND  HABIT  63 

your  life  to  suit  yourself.  Do  disappointment  and  de- 
spair gnaw  at  your  love  of  life  so  that  nothing  seems 
worth  while,  —  some  bottled  "  essence  of  sunshine  " 
will  give  new,  fresh  value  to  existence.  Are  you  a  vic- 
tim of  strange,  uncaused  fluctuations  of  mood  so  that 
periodically  you  descend  to  a  bottomless  pit  of  melan- 
choly,— well,  then,  why  suffer,  when  over  the  bar  a 
man  will  furnish  you  a  release  from  agony?  And  so 
men  of  certain  types  of  temperament,  or  with  unhappy 
experiences,  form  the  alcoholic  habit  because  it  gives 
them  surcease  from  pain;  it  deals  out  to  them,  tempo- 
rarily, a  new  world  with  happier  mood,  lessened  ten- 
sion and  greater  success. 

Seeking  relief  ^  from  distressing  thoughts  or  moods 
is  perhaps  one  of  the  main  causes  of  the  narcotic  habit. 
The  feeling  of  inferiority,  one  of  the  most  painful  of 
mental  conditions,  is  responsible  for  the  use  not  only 
of  alcohol  but  also  of  other  drugs,  such  as  cocaine, 
heroin,  morphine,  etc.  One  of  the  most  typical  cases 
of  this  I  have  known  is  of  a  young  man  of  twenty-five, 
a  tall  fellow  with  a  very  unattractive  face  who  had  this 
feeling  of  inferiority  almost  to  the  point  of  agony,  es- 
pecially in  the  presence  of  young  women,  but  also  in 
any  situation  where  he  would  be  noticed.  He  was  fast 
becoming  a  hermit  when  he  discovered  that  a  few  drinks 
completely  removed  this  feeling.  From  that  time  on  he 
became  a  steady  drinker,  with  now  and  then  a  short 
period  when  he  would  try  to  stop  drinking,  only  to 
resume  when  he  found  himself  obsessed  again  by  the 
dreaded  inferiority  complex. 

Similarly  a  shameful  position,  such  as  that  of  the 
prostitute  or  the  chronic  criminal,   is  "  relieved  "  by 

^  This  is  the  main  theme  of  De  Quincey's  "  Confessions  of  an  Opium 
Eater." 


64     THE  FOUNDATIONS  OF  PERSONALITY 

alcohol  and  drugs,  so  that  the  majority  of  these  types 
of  unfortunates  are  either  drunkards  or  "  dopes."  Too 
often  have  reformers  reversed  the  relationship,  believ- 
ing that  alcohol  caused  prostitution  and  crime.  Of 
course  that  relationship  exists,  but  more  often,  in  my 
experience,  the  alcohol  is  used  to  keep  up  the  "  ego " 
feeling,  without  which  few  can  bear  life. 

Curiously  enough,  one  of  the  sex  perversions,  mastur- 
bation, has  in  a  few  cases  a  similar  genesis.  I  have 
known  patients  who,  when  under  the  influence  of  de- 
pression, or  humiliated  in  some  way  or  other,  found  a 
compensating  pleasure  in  the  act.  Here  we  come  to 
a  cardinal  truth  in  the  understanding  of  ourselves  and 
our  fellows  and  one  we  shall  pursue  in  detail  later,  — 
that  face  to  face  with  mental  pain,  men  seek  relief  or 
pleasure  or  both  by  alcohol,  drugs,  sensual  pleasures 
of  all  kinds,  and  that  the  secret  explanation  of  all  such 
habits  is  that  they  offer  compensation  for  some  pain 
and  are  turned  to  at  such  times.  What  one  man  seeks 
in  work,  another  man  seeks  in  religion,  another  finds 
in  self-flagellation,  and,  still  others  seek  in'  alcohol, 
morphine,  sexual  excesses,  etc. 

With  the  increasing  excitement  and  tension  of  our 
times  there  is  a  constant  search  for  relief,  and  here  is 
the  origin  of  much  of  the  smoking.  Most  men  find  in 
the  deliberate  puff,  in  the  slow  inhalation  and  in  the 
prolonged  exhalation  with  the  formation  of  the  white 
cloud  of  smoke,  a  shifting  of  consciousness  from  the 
major  businesses  of  their  mind,  from  a  constant  tension 
to  a  minor  business  not  requiring  concentration  and 
thereby  breaking  up  in  a  pleasurable,  rhythmic  fashion 
the  sense  of  effort.  When  one  is  alone  the  fatigue  and 
even  the  pain  of  one's  thinking  is  relieved  by  shifting 
the  attention  to  the  smoking.    Keeping  one's  attention 


MEMORY  AND  HABIT  65 

at  a  high  and  constant  pitch  is  apt  to  produce  a  restless 
fatigue  and  this  is  often  offset  to  the  smoker  by  his 
habit.  Excessive  smoking  may  cause  "  nervousness " 
but  as  a  matter  of  fact  it  is  more  often  a  means  by  which 
the  excessively  nervous  try  to  relieve  themselves.  Of 
course  it  is  not  good  therapeutics  under  such  conditions, 
but  I  believe  that  in  moderation  smoking  does  no  harm 
and  is  an  innocent  pleasure. 

Some  of  the  pathological  motor  habits,  such  as  the 
tics,  often  have  a  curious  background.  The  most  com- 
mon tics  are  snuffing,  blinking,  shaking  of  the  head, 
facial  contortions  of  one  kind  or  another.  These  arise 
usually  under  exciting  conditions  or  in  the  excitable, 
sometimes  in  the  acutely  self-conscious.  Frequently 
they  represent  a  motor  outlet  for  this  excitement;  they 
are  the  motor  analogues  of  crying,  shouting,  laughing, 
etc.  (Indeed,  a  common  habit  is  the  one  so  frequently 
heard,  —  a  little  laugh  when  there  is  no  feeling  of  mer- 
riment and  no  occasion  for  it.)  Motor  activity  dis- 
charges tension  and  is  pleasurable  and  these  tics  furnish 
a  momentary  pleasure ;  they  relieve  a  feeling  that  some 
of  the  victims  compare  to  an  itch  and  the  habit  thus 
is  based  on  a  seeking  of  relief,  even  though  that  relief 
is  obtained  in  a  way  that  distresses  the  more  settled 
purposes  of  the  individual. 

In  the  establishment  of  good  habits,  those  desirable 
from  the  point  of  view  of  the  important  issues  of  life, 
training  is  of  course  essential.  But  in  the  training  of 
children,  certain  things  must  be  kept  in  mind :  the  use- 
fulness, the  practical  value  must  be  presented  to  the 
child's  mind  in  a  way  he  can  understand,  or  else  various 
ways  of  energizing  him  to  help  in  the  formation  of  the 
habit  must  be  used  —  praise  and  blame,  reward  and 
punishment.     Further,  these  habits  are  not  to  be  held 


66     THE  FOUNDATIONS  OF  PERSONALITY 

holy;  cleanliness  and  method  are  desirable  acquisitions 
but  not  so  desirable  as  a  feeling  of  freedom  to  play  and 
experiment  with  life  and  things.  If  the  child  is  con- 
stantly worried  lest  he  get  too  dirty,  or  fears  to  play 
in  his  room  because  he  may  disorder  it,  he  is  forming 
the  good  habits  of  cleanliness  and  method  but  also  the 
worse  one  of  worry. 

In  the  breaking  of  a  bad  habit,  its  root  in  desire  and 
difficulty  must  be  discovered.  Often  enough  a  man  does 
not  face  the  source  of  his  trouble,  preferring  not  to.  I 
am  not  at  all  sure  that  it  is  best  in  all  cases  for  a  man 
to  know  his  own  weakness;  in  fact,  I  feel  convinced  to 
the  contrary  in  some  cases.  But  in  the  majority  of 
difficulties,  self-revelation  is  salutary  and  makes  an  in- 
telligent coping  with  the  situation  possible.  Here  is 
the  value  of  the  good  friend,  the  respected  pastor,  the 
wise  doctor.  The  human  being  will  always  need  a  con- 
fessor and  a  confidante,  and  he  who  is  struggling  with 
a  habit  is  in  utmost  need  of  such  help. 

Shall  the  straggler  with  a  bad  habit  break  it  with  its 
thralldom?  Shall  he  say  to  his  chains,  "  From  this 
time,  nevermore !  "  To  some  men  it  is  given  to  win  the 
victory  this  way,  to  rise  to  the  heights  of  a  stubborn 
resolution  and  to  be  free.  But  not  to  many  is  this 
possible.  To  others  there  is  a  long  history  of  repeated 
effort  and  repeated  failures  and  then  —  one  day  there 
comes  a  feeling  of  power,  perhaps  through  a  great  love, 
a  great  cause,  a  sermon  heard,  a  chance  sentence,  or  a 
bitter  experience,  and  then,  like  a  religious  conversion, 
the  tracks  of  the  old  habit  are  obliterated,  never  to  be 
used  again. 

I  have  in  mind  two  men,  both  heavy  drinkers  but  dif- 
fering in  everything  else.  One  was  a  philosopher  who 
saw  the  world  in  that  dreadful,  clear  white  light  of 


MEMORY  AND  HABIT  67 

which  Jack  London  ^  spoke,  that  light  which  leaves  no 
cozy,  pleasant  obscurities,  in  which  Truth,  the  naked,  is 
horrible  to  look  at,  when  life  seems  too  unreal,  when 
purposes  seem  most  futile.  At  such  tiihes  he  would  get 
drunk  and  be  happy  for  the  time  being,  and  afterwards 
find  himself  bitterly  repentant,  though  even  that  was 
a  pleasure  compared  to  the  hollow  world  in  which  his 
sober  self  dwelt.  Then  one  day,  when  all  his  friends 
had  given  him  up  as  hopeless,  as  destined  for  disaster, 
he  read  a  book.  "  The  Varieties  of  Religious  Experi- 
ence," by  William  James,  came  to  him  as  a  clear  light 
comes  to  a  man  lost  in  the  darkness ;  he  saw  himself  as 
a  "  sick  soul,"  obsessed  with  the  idea  that  he  saw  life 
relentlessly  and  clearly.  There  came  to  him  the  con- 
viction that  he  had  been  arrogant,  a  conceited  ass,  bent 
on  ruin,  "a  sickly  soul,"  he  said.  Out  of  that  realiza- 
tion grew  resolutions  that  needed  no  vowing  or  pledg- 
ing, for  as  simply  as  a  man  turns  from  one  road  to  an- 
other he  turned  from  his  habit  into  healthy-minded 
work. 

The  other  was  an  essentially  healthy-minded  man  but 
he  loved  joviality,  freedom  and  good  fellowship.  With- 
out ever  knowing  how  he  came  to  it,  he  found  himself 
a  confirmed  drinker,  holding  an  inferior  place,  passed 
by  men  of  lesser  caliber.  He  struggled  fitfully  but 
always  slipped  when  the  next  "  good  fellow  "  slapped 
him  on  the  back  and  invited  him  to  have  a  drink.  One 
day  he  stepped  out  of  a  barroom  with  a  group  of  his 
cronies,  and  though  he  walked  straight  there  was  a 
reckless,  happy  feeling  in  him  that  pushed  him  on  to 
his  folly.  A  young  lady  svtanding  on  a  street  comer 
waiting  for  a  car  caught  hi?>  eye.  Signaling  to  his  com- 
panions, he  walked  up  to  ber,  put  his  arms  around  her 

*  Jack  LondoD's  "  John  Barleycol  u." 


68     THE  FOUNDATIONS  OF  PERSONALITY 

and  kissed  her.  The  girl  stood  as  if  petrified,  then  she 
pushed  him  off  and  looked  him  up  and  down  deliberately 
with  cold  scorn  in  her  eyes.  Then  she  took  off  her  glove 
and  slapped  him  across  the  face  with  it,  as  if  disdaining 
to  use  her  hand.    With  that  she  walked  away. 

The  man  was  a  gentleman,  and  he  stood  there 
stricken.  The  laugh  of  his  companions  aroused  him. 
He  saw  them  as  if  they  were  himself,  with  a  horror  and 
disgust  that  made  him  suddenly  run  away  from  them. 

"  From  that  moment  I  never  again  had  the  slightest 
desire  for  drink.     The  slap  sobered  me  for  good." 

While  these  conversions  occur  now  and  then  there 
are  certain  practical  points  in  the  breaking  of  a  habit 
that  need  attention  in  each  case. 

In  the  first  place  it  is  best  in  the  majority  of  instances 
to  avoid  the  particular  stimuli  and  associations  that 
set  off  the  habit.  The  stimulus  is  a  kind  of  trigger; 
pull  it  and  the  habit  can  hardly  be  checked.  Whatever 
the  situation  is  that  acts  as  the  temptation,  avoid  it. 
Not  for  nothing  do  men  pray,  "  Lead  us  not  into  tempta- 
tion." The  will  needs  no  such  exercise  and  rarely 
stands  up  well  against  such  strain.  This  may  mean  a 
removal  for  the  time  being  from  the  source  of  tempta- 
tion, a  flying  away  to  gain  strength. 

Further,  a  substitution  of  habit,  of  purpose,  is  nec- 
essary. Some  line  of  activities  must  be  selected  to  fill 
in  the  vacuum.  A  hobby  is  needed,  a  devotion  to  some 
larger  purpose,  whether  it  be  in  work  or  social  activity. 
"  Nature  abhors  a  vacuum  " ;  boredom  must  be  avoided, 
for  that  is  a  pain,  awakening  desire.  The  gymnasium, 
golf,  sports  of  all  kinds  are  substitute  pleasures  of  great 
value. 

Third,  harness  a  friend,  a  superior  or  a  respected 
equal  to  the  yoke  with  you.     Pull  double  harness;  let 


MEMORY  AND  HABIT  69 

him  lend  his  strength  to  yours.  Throw  away  pride; 
confess  and  receive  new  energy  from  his  sympathy  and 
wisdom.  If  you  are  lucky  enough  to  have  such  a  friend, 
or  some  wise  counselor,  thank  God  for  him.  For  here 
is  where  the  true  friend  finds  his  highest  value. 

In  the  analysis  of  any  character  the  question  of  the 
kind  of  habits  formed  demands  attention.  Since  almost 
all  traits  become  matters  of  habit,  such  an  inquiry 
would  sooner  or  later  lead  to  a  catalogue  of  qualities. 
What  is  here  pertinent  is  this,  —  that  one  might  in- 
quire into  the  kind  of  habits  that  are  easily  formed  by 
the  individual  and  the  kind  that  are  not.  Habits  fall 
into  groups  such  as  these : 

1.  Relating  to  care  of  the  body:  cleanliness,  diet,  ex- 
ercise, bowel  function,  sleep.  Here  we  learn  about  per- 
sonal tidiness  or  the  reverse,  foppery,  dandyism,  glut- 
tony, asceticism,  etc. 

2.  Relating  to  method,  efficiency,  neatness  in  work: 
some  people  find  it  almost  impossible  to  become  me- 
thodical or  neat ;  others  become  obsessed  by  these  qual- 
ities to  the  exclusion  of  mobility. 

3.  Relating  to  the  pursuit  of  pleasure :  type  of  pleas- 
ure sought,  time  given  to  it,  hobbies. 

4.  Relating  to  special  habits :  alcohol,  tobacco,  drugs, 
sex  perversions. 

5.  Relating  to  study  and  advancement :  love  of  books, 
attendance  at  lectures. 

Especially  in  the  study  of  children  is  some  such 
scheme  essential,  for  then  one  gets  a  definite  idea  of 
their  defects  and  takes  definite  efforts  to  maike  habitual 
the  desired  practice,  or  else  one  sees  the  special  trend, 
and,  if  it  is  good,  fosters  it.  This,  of  course,  is  the 
long  and  short  of  character  development. 


CHAPTER  IV 

STIMULATION,    INHIBITION,    ORGANIZING    ENERGY,    CHOICE 
AND  CONSCIOUSNESS 

There  are  three  fundamental  factors  in  the  relation 
of  any  organism  to  the  environnient  and  in  the  relation 
of  the  various  parts  of  an  organism  to  each  other  which 
we  must  now  consider.  To  consider  a  living  thing  of 
any  kind  as  something  separate  from  the  stimuli  the 
world  streams  in  on  it,  or  to  consider  it  as  a  real  unit, 
is  a  mistake  that  falsifies  most  of  the  thinking  of  the 
world. 

On  us,  as  living  things,  the  universe  pours  in  stimuli 
of  a  few  kinds.  Or  rather  there  are  few  kinds  of  stimuli 
we  are  specialized  to  receive  and  react  to ;  there  may  be 
innumerable  other  kinds  to  which  we  cannot  react  be- 
cause they  do  not  reach  us.  The  world  for  us  is  a  collec- 
tion of  things  that  we  see,  hear,  smell,  taste  and  feel,  but 
there  may  be  vast  reaches  of  things  for  which  we  have 
no  avenues  of  approach, —  completely  unimaginable 
things  because  our  images  are  built  upon  our  senses. 

To  some  of  the  stimuli  the  world  pours  in  on  us  we 
must  react  properly  or  die.  Certain  "  mechanisms  " 
with  which  we  are  equipped  must  respond  to  these  stim- 
uli or  the  forces  of  the  world  destroy  us.  A  lion  on 
the  horizon  must  awaken  flight,  or  concealment,  or 
the  modified  fight  reaction  of  using  weapons;  extreme 
cold  or  heat  must  start  up  impulses  and  reflexes  leading 
away  from   their  disintegrating  eflEects.     Food  must, 


CHOICE  AND  CONSCIOUSNESS  71 

when  smelled  or  seen,  lead  us  to  conduct  whereby  we 
supply  ourselves  or  we  die  from  hunger.  Dangers  and 
needs  awaken  reactions,  both  through  instinctive  re- 
sponses and  through  intelligence.  The  main  activities 
of  life  are  to  be  classed  as  "  averting  "  and  "  acquiring," 
for  if  life  showers  us  with  the  things  we  would  or  need 
to  have,  it  also  pelts  us  with  the  things  we  fear,  hate 
or  despise.  It  would  be  interesting  to  know  which  ac- 
tivities are  the  most  numerous;  presumably  the  lucky 
or  successful  man  is  busy  acquiring  while  the  unlucky 
or  unsuccessful  finds  himself  busiest  averting.  The 
averting  activities  are  directed  largely  against  the  dis- 
agreeable, disgusting,  dangerous  and  the  undesired ;  the 
acquiring  activities  are  directed  toward  the  pleasant, 
the  necessary,  the  desired.  The  problems  of  life  are  to 
know  what  is  really  good  or  bad  for  us  and  how  to 
acquire  the  one  and  avert  the  other.  While  there  are 
certain  things  that  "  naturally  "  ^  are  deemed  good  or 
bad,  there  are  more  that  are  so  regarded  through  train- 
ing and  education.  Morality  and  Taste  are  alike  con- 
cerned with  bringing  about  attitudes  that  will  deter- 
mine the  "  right "  response  to  the  stimuli  of  the  world. 

The  stimuli  that  thus  pour  in  upon  the  individual, 
and  to  which  he  must  react,  must  find  an  organism 
ready  to  respond  in  some  way  or  other.  A  sleeping 
man  naturally  does  not  adjust  himself  to  danger,  nor 
does  a  paralyzed  man  fly.  The  most  attractive  female 
in  the  world  causes  no  response  in  the  very  young  male 

*  I  place  in  quotations  naturally  because  it  is  diflScuIt  to  know  what 
is  "  natural "  and  what  is  cultural.  In  the  widest  sense  everything  is 
natural;  in  the  narrowest  very  few  things  are  natural.  Cooked  food, 
clothing,  houses,  marriages,  education,  etc.,  are  not  found  in  a  state 
of  nature,  any  more  than  clocks  and  plays  by  Ibsen  are.  Our  judgment 
as  to  what  is  good  and  bad  is  mainly  instinctive  leaning  directed  or 
smothered  by  education. 


72     THE  FOUNDATION^  OF  PEKSONALITY 

child  and  perhaps  stirs  only  reminiscences  in  the  aged. 
Food,  which  causes  the  saliva  to  flow  in  the  mouth  of 
the  hungry,  may  disgust  the  full.  Throughout  life 
there  are  factors  in  the  internal  life  of  the  organism 
instantly  changing  one's  reaction  to  things  of  physical, 
mental  and  moral  significance.  He  talks  loudest  of 
restraint  and  control  who  has  no  desire;  and  in  satia- 
tion even  the  sinner  sees  the  beauty  of  asceticism.  There 
must  be  a  coincidence  of  stimulus,  readiness  and  oppor- 
tunity for  the  full,  successful  response  to  take  place.^ 
The  simplest  response  to  any  stimulus  from  the  outer 
world  is  the  reflex  act.  Theoretically  a  reflex  act  is 
dependent  upon  the  interaction  of  a  sensory  surface,  a 
sensory  nerve  cell,  a  motor  nerve  cell  and  a  muscle, 
i.  e.,  a  receptive  apparatus  and  a  motor  apparatus  in 
such  close  union  that  the  will  and  intelligence  play 
no  part.  Thus  if  one  puts  his  finger  on  a  hot  stove 
he  withdraws  it  immediately,  and  such  responses  are 
present  even  in  the  decapitated  frog  and  human  for 
a  short  time.  So  if  light  streams  in  on  the  wide-open 
pupil  of  the  eye,  it  contracts,  grows  smaller,  without 
any  effort  of  the  will,  and  in  fact  entirely  without  the 
consciousness  of  the  individual.  Swallowing  is  a  series 
of  reflexes  in  a  row,  so  that  food  in  the  back  part  of  the 
mouth  sets  a  reflex  going  that  carries  it  beyond  the  epi- 
glottis; another  reflex  carries  it  to  the  esophagus  and 
then  one  reflex  after  the  other  transports  the  food  the 
rest  of  the  way.  Except  for  the  first  effort  of  swallow- 
ing, the  rest  is  entirely  involuntary  and  even  uncon- 
scious. Those  readers  who  are  interested  would  do 
well  to  read  the  work  of  Pavlow  on  the  conditioned 
reflex,  in  which  the  great  Kussian  physiologist  builds 

*  A  slang  epigram  puts  it  better :  The  time,  the  place,  and  the  girl. 


CHOICE  AND  CONSCIOUSNESS  73 

up  all  action  on  a  basis  of  a  modification  of  the  primi- 
tive reflex  which  he  calls  the  "conditioned  reflex."  ^ 

The  simple  reflex,  immediate  response  to  a  stimulus, 
has  only  a  limited  field  in  human  life  or  adult  life. 
Sherrington  points  out  in  his  notable  book,  "  The  Integ- 
rative Action  of  the  Nervous  System,^'  that  there  is  a 
play  of  the  entire  organism  on  each  responding  element, 
and  there  is  also  a  competition  throughout  eacji  path- 
way to  action.     Let  us  examine  this  a  little  closer. 

A  man  is  hungry,  let  us  say ;  i.  e.,  there  arise  from  his 
gastro-intestinal  tract  and  from  the  tissues  stimuli 
which  arouse  motor  mechanisms  to  action  and  the  man 
seeks  food.  The  need  of  the  body  arouses  desire  in 
the  form  of  an  organic  sensation  and  this  arouses  mech- 
anisms whose  function  is  to  satisfy  that  desire.  Let 
us  assume  that  he  finds  something  that  looks  good  and  he 
is  about  to  seize  it  when  an  odor,  called  disagreeable,  as- 
sails his  nostrils  from  the  food,  which  stops  him.  Then 
there  arises  a  competition  for  action  between  the  desire 
for  food  and  the  visual  stimulus,  associated  memories, 
etc.,  on  the  one  hand,  and  the  odor,  the  awakened  fear, 
memories,  disgust,  etc.,  on  the  other  hand.  This  strug- 
gle for  action,  for  use  of  the  mechanisms  of  action,  is 
the  struggling  of  choosing,  one  of  the  fundamental  phe- 
nomena of  life.  In  order  for  a  choice  to  become  mani- 
fest, what  is  known  as  inhibition  must  come  into  play ; 
an  impulse  to  action  must  be  checked  in  order  that  an 

*Pavlow  is  one  of  the  scientists  who  regard  all  mental  life  as  built 
up  out  of  reflexes.  The  immediate  reflex  is  only  one  variety;  thought, 
emotion,  etc.,  are  merely  reflexes  placed  end  to  end.  Pavlow  divides 
action  into  two  trends,  one  due  to  an  unconditioned  reflex,  of  innate 
structure,  and  the  other  a  modified  or  conditioned  reflex  which  arises 
because  some  stimulus  has  become  associated  with  the  reflex  act.  Thus 
saliva  dripping  from  a  dog's  mouth  at  the  smell  of  food  is  an  uncon- 
ditioned reflex;  if  a  bell  is  heard  at  the  same  time  the  food  is  smelled 
then  in  the  course  of  time  the  saliva  flows  at  the  sound  of  the  bell 
alone, —  a  conditioned  reflex.  A  very  complex  system  has  been  built 
up  of  this  kind  of  facts,  which  I  have  criticized  elsewhere. 


74     THE  FOUNDATIONS  OF  PERSONALITY 

opposing  action  can  be  effective.  The  movement  of  re- 
jection uses  muscles  that  oppose  the  movement  of  ac- 
quirement; e.  g.,  one  uses  the  triceps  and  the  other  the 
biceps,  muscles  situated  in  opposite  sides  of  the  upper 
arm  and  having  antagonistic  action.  In  order  for  tri- 
ceps to  act,  biceps  must  be  inhibited  from  action,  and 
in  that  inhibition  is  a  fundamental  function  of  the 
organism.  In  every  function  of  the  body  there  are 
opposing  groups  of  forces;  for  every  dilator  there  is  a 
contractor,  for  every  accelerator  of  action  there  is  in- 
hibition. Nature  drives  by  two  reins,  and  one  is  a 
checkrein. 

This  function  of  inhibition,  then,  delays,  retards  or 
prevents  an  action  and  is  in  one  sense  a  higher  function 
than  the  response  to  stimulation.  Its  main  seat  is  the 
cerebrum,  the  "  highest "  nervous  tissue,  whereas  reflex 
and  instinctive  actions  usually  are  in  the  vegetative 
nervous  system,  the  spinal  cord,  the  bulbar  regions  and 
the  mid-brain,  all  of  which  are  lower  centers.  Choice, 
which  is  intimately  associated  with  inhibition,  is  par 
excellence  a  cerebral  function  and  in  general  is  asso- 
ciated with  intense  consciousness.  The  act  of  choosing 
brings  to  the  circumstances  the  whole  past  history  of 
the  individual ;  it  marshals  his  resources  of  judgment, 
intelligence,  will,  purposes  and  desires.  In  choice  lies 
the  fate  of  the  personality,  for  it  is  basically  related  to 
habit  formation.  Further,  in  the  dynamics  of  life  a 
right,  proper  choice,  an  appropriate  choice,  opens  wide 
the  door  of  opportunity,  whereas  an  unfortunate  choice 
may  commit  one  to  the  mercies  of  wrecking  forces.  Ed- 
ucation should  aim  to  teach  proper  choosing  and  then 
proper  action. 

The  capacity  for  perceiving  and  responding  to  stim- 
uli, for  inhibiting  or  delaying  action  and  for  choosing, 


CHOICE  AND  CONSCIOUSNESS  75 

are  of  cardinal  importance  in  our  study.  But  there  is 
another  phase  of  life  and  character  without  which  every- 
thing else  lacks  unity  and  is  unintelligible.  From  the 
beginning  of  life  to  the  end  there  is  choice.  Who  and 
what  chooses?  From  infancy  one  sees  the  war  of  pur- 
poses and  desires  and  the  gradual  rise  of  one  purpose  or 
set  of  purposes  into  dominance,  —  in  short,  the  growth 
of  unity,  the  growth  of  personality.  The  common  man 
calls  this  unity  his  soul,  the  philosopher  speaks  of  the 
ego  and  implies  some  such  thing  as  this  organizing  en- 
ergy of  character. 

But  a  naturalistic  view  of  character  must  reject  such 
a  metaphysical  entity,  for  one  sees  the  organizing  energy 
increase  and  diminish  with  the  rest  of  character  through 
health,  age,  environment,  etc.  Further,  there  is  at 
work  in  all  living  things  a  similar  something  that  or- 
ganizes the  action  of  the  humblest  bit  of  protoplasm. 
This  organizing  energy  of  character  will  be,  for  us,  that 
something  inherent  in  all  life  which  tends  to  individ- 
ualize each  living  thing.  It  is  as  if  all  life  were  origi- 
nally of  one  piece  and  then,  spreading  itself  through- 
out the  world,  it  tended  to  differentiate  and  develop 
(according  to  the  Spencerian  formula)  into  genera, 
species,  groups  and  individuals.  This  organizing  en- 
ergy works  up  the  experiences  of  the  individual  so  that 
new  formulae  for  action  develop,  so  that  what  is  ex- 
perienced becomes  the  basis  of  future  reaction. 

It  must  be  remembered  that  the  world  we  live  in  has 
its  great  habits.  Night  follows  day  in  a  cycle  that  never 
fails,  the  seasons  are  repeated  each  year,  and  there  is  a 
periodicity  in  the  lives  of  plants  and  animals  that  is 
manifested  in  growth,  nutrition,  mating  and  resting. 
Things  happen  again  and  again,  though  in  slightly  al- 
tered form,  and  our  desires,  satisfied  now,  soon  repeat 


76     THE  FOUNDATIONS  OF  PERSONALITY 

their  urge.  The  great  organic  needs  and  sensations 
repeat  themselves  and  with  the  periodic  world  of  outer 
experience  must  be  dealt  with  according  to  a  more  or 
less  settled  policy.  It  is  the  organizing  energy  that 
works  out  the  policy,  that  learns,  inhibits,  chooses  and 
acts, —  and  it  is  the  essential  character-developing  prin- 
ciple. For  like  our  bodily  organs  which  are  whipped 
into  line  by  the  nervous  system,  our  impulses,  instincts, 
and  reflexes  ^  have  their  own  policy  of  action  and  there- 
fore need,  for  the  good  of  the  entire  organism,  discipline 
and  coordination.  It  may  sound  as  if  the  body  were 
made  up  of  warring  entities  and  states  and  that  there 
gradually  arose  a  centralized  good,  and  though  the 
analogy  may  lead  to  error,  it  offers  a  convenient  method 
of  thinking. 

Moreover,  the  organizing  energy  seems  often  to  be  at 
work  when  consciousness  itself  is  at  rest,  as  in  sleep. 
Often  enough  a  man  debates  and  debates  on  lines  of 
conduct  and  wakes  up  with  his  problem  solved.  Or  he 
works  hard  to  learn  and  goes  to  bed  discouraged,  be- 
cause the  matter  is  a  jumble,  and  wakes  up  in  the  morn- 
ing with  an  orderly  and  useful  arrangement  of  the  facts. 
A  writer  seeks  to  find  the  proper  opening,  —  and  gives 
up  in  a  frenzy  of  despair.  He  is  perhaps  walking  or 
driving  when  suddenly  he  lifts  his  head  as  one  does  who 
is  listening  to  a  longed-for  voice,  and  in  himself  he 
finds  the  phrases  that  he  longs  for.  Something  within 
has  set  itself,  so  it  seems,  the  task  of  bringing  the  right 
associations  into  consciousness.  What  we  call  quick- 
ness of  mind,  energy  of  mind,  is  largely  this  function. 

^Roux,  the  great  French  biologist,  has  shown  that  each  tissue  and 
each  cell  competes  with  the  other  tissues  and  the  other  cells.  The 
organism,  though  it  reaches  a  practical  working  unity  as  viewed  by 
consciousness,  is  nevertheless  no  entity;  it  is  a  collection,  an  aggregate 
of  living  cells  which  are  organized  on  a  cooperation  basis  just  as  men 
are,  but  maintain  individuality  and  competition  nevertheless. 


CHOICE  AND  CONSCIOUSNESS  77 

It  is  this  which  adapts  us  to  different  situations,  dif- 
ferent groups,  by  calling  into  play  organized  modes  of 
talking  or  acting.  We  pass  from  a  group  of  ladies  in 
whose  presence  we  have  been  friendly  but  decorous, 
perhaps  unconventionally  formal,  to  a  group  of  business 
intimates,  men  of  long  acquaintance.  Without  even 
being  conscious  of  it  we  lounge  around,  feet  on  the  table, 
carelessly  dropping  cigarette  ash  to  the  floor,  using  lan- 
guage chosen  for  force  rather  than  elegance ;  we  discuss 
sports,  women,  business  and  a  whole  group  of  different 
emotions,  habits  and  purposes  come  to  the  surface, 
though  we  were  not  at  all  conscious  of  having  repressed 
them  while  in  the  presence  of  the  ladies.  A  faiix  pas  is 
where  the  organizer  has  "  slipped  "  on  his  job ;  lack  of 
tact  implies  in  part  a  rigid  organizing  energy,  neither 
plastic  nor  versatile  enough. 

We  are  now  ready  to  face  certain  developments  of 
these  three  main  factors,  viz.,  the  response  to  stimuli; 
choice  and  inhibition,  and  the  organizing  energy. 
Largely  we  might  classify  people  according  to  the  type 
of  vigor  of  their  reactions  to  stimuli,  the  quality  and 
vigor  of  choice  and  of  inhibition,  and  the  quality  and 
vigor  of  the  organizing  energy.  We  note  that  there  are 
people  who  have,  as  it  were,  exquisitely  sensitive  feelers 
for  the  stimuli  of  one  kind  or  another  and  who  react 
vigorously,  perhaps  excessively;  that  there  are  others 
of  a  duller,  less  reactive  nature,  largely  because  they 
are  stimuli-proof.  Others  are  under-inhibited,  follow 
desire  or  outer  stimulus  without  heed,  without  a  brake ; 
others  are  over-inhibited,  too  cautious,  too  full  of  doubt, 
unable  to  choose  the  reaction  that  seems  appropriate. 
The  organizing  energy  of  some  is  low ;  they  never  seem 
to  unify  their  experiences  into  a  code  of  life  and  living ; 
they  are  like  a  string  of  beads  loosely  strung  together 


78     THE  FOUNDATIONS  OF  PERSONALITY 

with  disharmonious  emotions,  desires,  purposes.  In 
others  this  energy  is  high,  they  chew  the  cud  of  every  ex- 
perience and  (to  change  the  metaphor)  they  weld  life's 
happenings,  their  memories,  their  emotions  and  pur- 
poses into  a  more  unified  ego,  a  real  I,  harmonious,  self- 
enlightened;  clearly  conscious  of  aim  and  end  and 
striving  bravely  towards  it.  Or  there  is  over-unifica- 
tion and  fanaticism,  with  narrow  aim  and  little  sym- 
pathy for  other  aims.  Sketched  in  this  very  broad  way 
we  see  masses  of  people,  rather  than  individuals,  and 
we  are  not  finely  adjusted  to  our  subject. 

Psychologists  rarely  concern  themselves  to  any  extent 
with  these  matters;  they  deal  mainly  with  their  out- 
growths,—  emotions,  instinct,  intelligence  and  will.  We 
are  at  once  beset  with  difftculties  which  are  resolved 
mainly  by  ignoring  them.  In  such  a  book  as  this  we 
are  not  concerned  with  the  fundamental  nature  of  these 
divisions  of  the  mental  life,  we  must  omit  such  questions 
as  the  relation  of  instinct  to  racial  habit,  or  the  evolu- 
tion of  instinct  from  habit,  if  that  is  really  its  origin. 
Again  I  must  repeat  that  we  shall  deal  with  these  as 
organic,  as  arising  in  the  sensitized  individual  as  a  re- 
sult of  environmental  forces,  as  manifestations  of  a 
life  which  is  as  yet  —  and  perhaps  always  will  be  — 
mysterious  to  us.  We  shall  best  consider  these  mani- 
festations of  mental  activity  as  an  interplay  of  the 
reactions  of  stimulation,  inhibition,  choice,  organizing 
energy,  and  not  as  separate  and  totally  different  mat- 
ters. We  shall  see  that  probably  emotion  is  one  aspect 
of  reaction  to  the  world,  while  instinct  is  merely  an- 
other aspect;  that  intelligence  is  a  cerebral  shift  of 
instinct,  and  that  will  is  no  unity  but  the  energy  of 
instincts  and  purposes. 

Before  we  go  farther  we  must  squarely  face  a  prob- 


CHOICE  AND  CONSCIOUSNESS  79 

lem  of  human  thought.  Man,  since  he  started  reflecting 
about  himself,  has  been  puzzled  about  his  consciousness. 
How  can  a  person  be  aware  of  himself,  and  what  identi- 
fies and  links  together  each  phase  of  consciousness? 
There  is  an  enormous  range  of  thought  on  this  subject : 
from  those  who  identified  consciousness  as  the  only 
reality  and  considered  what  the  average  person  holds  as 
realities  —  things  and  people  —  as  only  phases  of  con- 
sciousness, to  those  who,  like  Huxley,  regard  conscious- 
ness as  an  "  epi-phenomenon,"  a  sort  of  overture  to 
brain  activity  and  having  nothing  whatever  to  do  with 
action,  nothing  to  do  with  choice  and  plan,  so  that,  as 
Lloyd  Morgan  points  out,  "  An  unconscious  Shakespeare 
writes  plays  acted  by  an  unconscious  troupe  of  actors 
to  an  unconscious  audience."  The  first  extreme  view, 
that  of  Berkeley  and  the  idealists,  nullifies  all  other 
realities  save  that  of  the  individual  thinker  and  reduces 
one  to  the  absurdities  of  Solipsism  where  a  man  writes 
books  to  convince  persons  conjured  up  by  himself  and 
having  no  existence  outside  of  himself;  the  other  view 
nullifies  that  which  seems  to  each  of  us  the  very  essence 
of  himself. 

I  shall  take  a  very  simple  view  of  consciousness,* 
simply  because  I  shall  deliberately  dodge  the  great  dif- 
ficulties. Consciousness  is  the  result  of  the  activities 
of  a  group  of  more  or  less  permanently  excited  areas  of 
the  brain  —  areas  having  to  do  with  positions  of  the 
head,  eyes  and  shoulders ;  areas  having  to  do  with  vision, 
hearing  and  smell;  areas  having  to  do  with  speech, — 
these  constituting  extremely  mobile,  extremely  active 

*For  discussion  of  consciousness  read  Berkeley,  Locke,  Hume, 
Spencer,  Lotze,  Moyan,  James,  Wundt,  Miinsterberg  and  every  other 
philosopher  and  psychologist.  I  have  not  attempted  to  discuss  the 
matter  from  the  philosopher's  point  of  view  for  the  very  obvious  rea- 
son that  I  am  no  philosopher. 


80     THE  FOUNDATIONS  OF  PERSONALITY 

parts  of  the  organism.  From  these  consciousness  may 
irradiate  to  the  activities  of  almost  every  part  of  the 
organism,  in  different  degrees.  We  are  often  extremely 
conscious  of  the  activities  of  the  hands,  in  less  degree  of 
the  legs ;  we  may  become  wrapped  up  almost  completely 
in  a  sensation  emanating  from  the  sex  organs,  and  under 
fear  or  excitement  the  heart  may  pound  so  that  we  feel 
and  are  conscious  of  it  as  ordinarily  we  can  never  be. 
The  state  of  consciousness  called  interest  may  shift  our 
feeling  of  self  to  any  part  of  our  body  ( as  in  pain,  when 
a  part  usually  out  of  consciousness  swings  into  it,  or 
when  the  hand  of  a  lover  grips  our  own  so  that  the  great 
reality  of  our  life  at  the  moment  seems  to  be  the  con- 
sciousness of  the  hand)  or  it  may  fasten  us  to  an  outside 
object  until  our  world  narrows  to  that  object,  nothing 
else  having  any  conscious  value.  This  latter  phenome- 
non is  very  striking  in  children ;  they  become  fascinated 
by  something  they  hear  or  see  and  project  themselves, 
as  it  were,  into  that  object;  they  become  the  "  soapiness 
of  soap,  or  the  wetness  of  water  "  (to  use  Chesterton's 
phrase),  and  when  they  listen  to  a  story  they  hold  noth- 
ing in  reserve.  Consciousness  may  busy  itself  with  its 
past  phases,  with  the  preceding  thought,  emotion,  sen- 
sation —  how,  I  do  not  know  —  or  it  may  occupy  itself 
mainly  with  the  world  of  things  which  are  hereby  de- 
clared to  have  a  reality  in  our  theory.  In  the  first 
instances  we  have  introspection  and  subjectiveness,  and 
in  the  second  we  have  extroversion  and  objectivity. 

Since  consciousness  is  most  intense  when  the  new  or 
unfamiliar  is  seen,  heard,  felt  or  attempted,  we  may  as- 
sume it  has  a  chief  function  in  acquainting  the  indi- 
vidual with  the  new  and  unfamiliar  and  in  the  estab- 
lishment of  habitual  reactions.    We  are  extraordinarily 


CHOICE  AND  CONSCIOUSNESS  81 

conscious  of  a  queer,  unexplainable  thing  on  the  horizon, 
we  bring  into  the  limelight  (or  it  brings  into  the  lime- 
light) all  our  possible  reactions, —  fear,  flight,  anger, 
fight,  circumvention,  curiosity  and  the  movements  of 
investigation;  we  are  thrown  into  the  maelstrom  of 
choice.  Choice  and  consciousness,  doubt  and  conscious- 
ness, are  directly  related;  it  is  only  when  conduct 
becomes  established  as  habit,  with  choosing  relegated 
to  the  background,  that  consciousness,  in  so  far  as  the 
act  is  concerned,  becomes  diminished. 

A  moderate  constant  sensation  tends  to  disappear 
from  consciousness,  as  when  we  keep  our  hand  in  warm 
water.  It  then  takes  a  certain  increase  of  the  stimulus 
to  keep  the  sensation  from  lapsing  out  of  consciousness. 
This  lapsing  out  of  consciousness  of  the  steady  stimulus, 
in  its  ramifications,  is  responsible  for  a  good  deal  of  the 
activity  of  man,  since  sensation  is  a  goal  of  effort.^ 
Under  emotion  we  become  aware  of  two  sets  of  things, — 
the  reaction  of  our  body  in  its  sum  total  of  pleasure  or 
the  reverse,  and  second  the  object  that  sets  up  this 
reaction.  Consciousness  fastens  itself  on  the  body  and 
on  the  world,  and  the  bodily  reaction  becomes  a  guide 
for  future  action.  Extreme  bodily  reactions  are  pain- 
ful and  may  result  in  the  abolishing  of  consciousness. 

We  assume  that  consciousness  is  organic,  though  we 
concede  that  it  may  be  true  that  it  is  borrowed  from  a 

*  The  physiologists  speak  of  this  phenomenon  under  the  heading  of 
the  Weber-Fechner  law,  after  the  two  physiologists  who  gave  it  promi- 
mence.  James  pokes  a  good  deal  of  fun  at  the  "  law,"  which  is  expressed 
mathematically.  Perhaps  the  mathematics  should  have  been  eliminated 
as  too  "  scientific "  for  our  present  attainment,  but  it  does  remain 
true  that  it  is  not  the  actual  stimulus  increase  that  is  important  in 
sensation  or  perception,  but  the  relative  stimulus  increase.  This  is 
behind  all  of  "  getting  used  to  things " ;  it  removes  the  pain  from 
humiliation  and  also  the  novelty  from  joy.  It  is  the  reason  behind 
all  of  the  searching  for  novelty  and  excitement. 


82     THE  FOUNDATIONS  OF  PERSONALITY 

great  pool  of  consciousness  ^  out  of  which  we  all  come. 
Consciousness  is  organic  because  a  blow  on  the  head 
may  abolish  it  as  may  drugs  and  disease,  or  a  shifting 
of  the  blood  supply  as  in  emotion  or  fatigue  in  the  form 
of  sleep,  etc.  Where  does  it  go  to  and  how  does  it 
come  back?  The  savage  answered  that  question  by 
building  up  the  idea  of  a  soul,  a  thing  that  might  mi- 
grate, had  an  independent  existence,  took  journeys  in 
the  form  of  dreams  and  lived  and  flourished  after  death. 
Most  of  these  ideas  still  persist,  perhaps  as  much 
through  the  fear  of  annihilation  as  anything  else,  but 
as  to  whether  or  not  they  are  true  this  book  does  not 
concern  itself.  We  have  no  proof  of  these  matters,  but 
we  can  prove  that  we  can  play  on  consciousness  as  we 
play  on  a  piano,  through  the  body  and  brain.  A  blow 
injures  groups  of  nerve  cells  and  consciousness  disap- 
pears ;  when  they  recover,  it  returns.  Where  does  any 
function  go  when  structure  is  injured?  We  have  prac- 
tically the  same  kind  of  proof  for  the  position  of  con- 
sciousness as  a  function  of  the  brain  and  body  that  we 
have  for  gastric  juice  as  a  secretion  of  gastric  cells. 

However  widely  we  spread  the  function  of  conscious- 
ness and  its  domain,  we  still  leave  a  large  field  of  activ- 
ities untouched.  And  so  we  come  to  the  conception  of 
the  subconsciousness.  There  are  two  prevailing  sets  of 
opinions  concerning  the  subconscious. 

The  first  is  quite  matter-of-fact.  It  states  that  the 
movements  and  activities  of  a  large  part  of  the  body 
are  outside  of  the  realm  of  consciousness,  such  as  the 

*  Even  if  it  were  true  that  consciousness  is  the  only  reality,  nobody 
really  believes  it  in  that  nobody  acts  as  if  it  were  true.  Conversely, 
everybody  acts  as  if  trees,  rocks,  and  people  were  realities;  as  if  fa- 
tigue, sickness,  age,  etc.,  affected  consciousness.  That  is  why,  in  thia 
book,  we  are  discarding  as  irrelevant  the  "  ultimate  "  truth  concerning 
consciousness.  My  humble  belief  is  that  the  ultimate  truth  in  this 
matter  will  never  concern  us  because  we  shall  never  know  it. 


CHOICE  AND  CONSCIOUSNESS  83 

activities  of  the  great  viscera  —  heart,  lungs,  intestines 
liver,  blood  vessels,  sex  glands  —  and  are  largely  oper 
ated  by  the  vegetative  nervous  system.^  There  are  in 
fluences  pouring  into  the  brain  from  these  organs 
together  with  influences  from  muscles,  joints,  tendons 
and  these  influences,  though  not  consciously  itemized 
are  the  subconsciously  received  stimuli  which  give  us 
feelings  of  vigor,  energy,  courage,  hopefulness,  or  the 
reverse,  according  to  the  state  of  the  organism.  In 
health  the  ordinary  result  of  these  stimuli  is  good, 
though  people  may  have  health  in  that  no  definite 
disease  is  present,  and  yet  there  is  some  deficiency 
in  the  energy-arousing  viscera  which  brings  a  lowered 
ccenesthesia,  a  lessened  vigor  and  lowered  mood.  In 
youth  the  state  of  the  organs  brings  a  state  of  well 
feeling;  in  old  age  there  is  a  constant  feeling  of  a  low 
balance  of  energy  and  mood,  and  the  person  is  always 
on  the  verge  of  unpleasant  feeling.  In  the  great  change 
periods  of  life  —  at  puberty  and  the  climacteric  (or  the 
menopause)  — the  sudden  change  in  the  activity  of  the 
sex  organs  may  produce  great  alterations^  in  the  coe- 
naesthesia  and  therefore  in  the  energy  and  mood  of  the 
individual. 

*  This  is  not  the  place  to  describe  the  vegetative  nervous  system. 
(It  was  formerly  called  the  sympathetic  nervous  system,  but  this 
term  is  now  limited  to  one  part  of  this  system,  and  the  term  autonomic 
to  another  part,  although  some  writers  still  use  the  term  sympathetic 
for  the  whole,  and  others  [the  English]  the  term  autonomic  for  the 
whole.)  This  system  is  the  nervous  mechanism  of  organic  life,  regulat- 
ing heart,  lungs,  blood  vessels,  intestines,  sex  organs,  acting  together 
with  endocrines,  etc.  A  huge  amount  of  work  has  been  done  of  late 
years  on  this  system  and  we  know  definitely  that  it  stimulates,  inhibits 
and  regulates  these  organs,  and  also  that  it  records  their  activities.  We 
are  commencing  to  believe  that  this  system  is  fully  as  important,  in 
mental  life,  as  the  brain.     See  Langley,  SchaeflFer,  Higier,  etc. 

"This  is  especially  true  of  the  menopause  in  women,  and  often  enough 
of  each  menstrual  period.  That  there  is  a  climacteric  in  men  is  not 
so  clear,  but  something  corresponding  to  it  occurs,  at  least  in  the 
case  of  some  men. 


84  THE  FOUNDATIONS  OF  PERSONALITY 

In  addition,  these  activities,  which  are  so  all-impor- 
tant, determine  the  basic  conduct  by  arousing  the  basic 
appetites  and  desires  of  the  individual.  It  is  the  change 
in  the  gastro-intestinal  tract  and  in  the  tissues  of  the 
body  that  starts  up  the  hunger  feeling  and  the  impulses 
which  prompt  men  to  seek  food;  in  other  words,  this 
type  of  coensBsthesia  has  set  going  all  the  physical  and 
mental  activities  relating  to  food;  it  is  the  basic  im- 
pulse behind  agriculture  and  stock  raising,  as  well  as 
energizing  work  activities  of  all  kinds.  It  is  the  tension 
in  the  seminal  vessels  of  the  male  that  wakes  up  his 
passion,  if  it  is  not  the  sole  source  of  that  passion.  Sex 
desire  in  the  adult  male  has  many  elements  in  it,  not 
pertinent  at  present,  but  the  coenaesthetic  influence  of 
the  physical  structures  is  its  starting  point.  In  men 
as  well  as  women  there  is  a  cycle  of  desire,  with  height 
due  to  physical  tension  and  abyss  following  the  dis- 
charge or  disappearance  of  tension,  that  profoundly  in- 
fluences life  and  conduct.  Here  the  sympathetic  nervous 
system  and  the  internal  secretion  of  the  genital  glands 
awaken  into  sexual  activity  brain,  spinal  cord  and  mus- 
cles, so  that  the  individual  seeks  a  mate,  plunges  into 
marriage  and  directs  his  conduct,  conscious  of  taste  and 
desire,  but  largely  unconscious  of  the  physical  condition 
that  is  impelling  him  on.  In  this  sense  the  subconscious 
activities  dominate  in  life,  because  the  functions  of 
nutrition  and  reproduction  are  largely  unconscious  in 
their  origin,  but  there  is  no  organized,  plotting  subcon- 
sciousness at  work. 

Once  a  thing  is  experienced,  it  is  stored  in  memory. 
What  is  the  basis  and  position  of  a  memory  when  we 
are  not  conscious  of  it,  when  our  conscious  minds  are 
busy  with  other  matters?  What  happens  when  ariiesire 
is  repressed,  inhibited  into  inaction ;  when  consciousness 


CHOICE  AND  CONSCIOUSNESS  85 

revolts  against  part  of  its  own  content?  Is  a  "  for- 
gotten "  memory  ever  really  lost,  or  a  desire  that  is 
squelched  and  thrust  out  of  "  mind  "  really  made  inac- 
tive? Do  our  inhibitions  really  inhibit,  or  do  we  build 
up  another  self  or  set  of  selves  that  rise  to  the  surface 
under  strange  forms,  under  the  guise  of  disease  mani- 
festations? 

Sigmund  Freud  and  his  followers  have  made  definite 
answers  to  the  foregoing,  answers  that  are  incorporated 
in  a  doctrine  called  Freudianism.  Freud  is  an  Aus- 
trian Jew,  a  physician,  and  one  that  soon  specialized  in 
nervous  and  mental  diseases.  Early  in  his  career  he  did 
some  excellent  work  in  the  study  of  the  paralysis  of 
childhood  (infantile  hemiplegia),  but  his  attention  and 
that  of  an  older  colleague,  Breuer,  were  soon  drawn  (as 
has  occurred  to  almost  every  neurologist)  to  the  mani- 
festations of  that  extraordinary  disease,  hysteria.  Hys- 
teria has  played  so  important  a  role  in  human  history, 
and  Freud's  ideas  are  permeating  so  deeply  into  modern 
thought  that  I  deem  it  advisable  to  devote  a  chapter  to 
them. 


CHAPTER  V 

HYSTERIA,  SUBCONSCIOUSNESS  AND  FREUDIANISM 

Hysteria  was  known  to  the  ancients  and  in  fact  is 
as  old  as  the  written  history  of  mankind.  Considered 
essentially  a  disease  of  women,  it  was  given  its  present 
name  which  is  derived  from  "  hysteron,"  the  Greek 
name  for  the  womb.  We  know  to-day  that  men  also 
are  victims  of  this  malady,  though  it  arises  under  some- 
what different  circumstances  than  is  the  case  with  the 
other  sex.  Men  and  women,  living  in  the  same  world 
and  side  by  side,  are  placed  in  greatly  different  positions 
in  that  world,  are  governed  by  different  traditions  and 
are  placed  under  the  influences  of  differing  ambitions, 
expectations,  hopes  and  fears.  Hysteria  arises  largely 
out  of  the  emotional  and  volitional  reactions  of  life,  and 
these  reactions  differ  in  the  sexes. 

It  was  a  group  of  French  neurologists,  headed  by 
Charcot  —  and  including  very  illustrious  men,  such  as 
Janet  and  Marie,  who  paid  the  first  scientific  attention 
to  the  disease.  Under  their  analyses  hysteria  was  de- 
fined as  a  mental  disease  in  which  certain  symptoms 
appeared  prominentlj''. 

1.  Charcot  especially  paid  attention  to  what  are 
known  as  the  attacks.  The  hysteric  patient  (usually  a 
woman,  and  so  we  shall  speak  of  the  patient  as  "  she  ") 
under  emotional  stress  and  strain,  following  a  quarrel 
or  a  disagreement  or  perhaps  some  disagreeable,  humili- 
ating situation,  shows  alarming  symptoms.     Perhaps 


SUBCONSCIOUSNESS  AND  FREUDIANISM    87 

she  falls  (never  in  a  way  to  injure  herself)  to  the  floor 
and  apparently  loses  consciousness,  closes  her  eyes,  rolls 
her  head  from  side  to  side,  moans,  clenches  her  fists, 
lifts  her  body  from  the  floor  so  that  it  rests  on  head  and 
heels  (opisthotonic  hysteria),  shrieks  now  and  then 
and  altogether  presents  a  terrifying  spectacle.  Or  else 
she  twitches  all  over,  weeps,  moans,  laughs  and  shouts, 
and  rushes  around  the  room,  beating  her  head  on  the 
walls ;  or  she  may  lie  or  stand  in  a  very  dramatic  pose, 
perhaps  indicating  passion  or  fear  or  anger.  The  at- 
tacks are  characterized  by  a  few  main  peculiarities, 
which  are  that  the  patient  usually  has  had  an  emotional 
upset  or  is  in  some  disagreeable  situation,  that  she  does 
not  hurt  herself  by  her  falls,  that  consciousness  is  never 
completely  abolished  and  fluctuates  so  that  now  she 
seems  almost  "  awake  "  and  then  she  seems  almost  in  a 
complete  stupor,  and  that  the  expression  of  emotion  in 
the  attack  is  often  very  prominent.  These  symptoms 
are  readily  differentiated  from  what  is  seen  in  epilepsy.^ 
2.  The  hysteric  paralyses  which  are  featured  in  all 
the  literatures  of  the  world  are  curious  manifestations 
and  often  very  stubborn.  Following  an  accident  (espe- 
cially in  industry  and  in  war)  and  after  some  emotional 
difficulty  there  is  a  paralysis  of  some  part  of  the  body. 
The  arm  or  some  particular  part  of  the  arm  cannot  be 
moved  by  the  will,  is  paralyzed;  or  else  the  difficulty 
involves  one  or  both  legs.  Sometimes  speech  is  gone, 
or  the  power  of  moving  the  head ;  occasionally  the  diffi- 
culty is  with  one  side  of  the  face,  etc.  Usually  the 
paralysis  comes  on  suddenly,  but  often  it  comes  on  grad- 

*The  French  writers  of  the  school  of  Babinski  deny  that  the  above 
symptom  and  even  the  majority  of  the  following  have  a  real  existence 
in  hysteria.  The  English,  American  and  German  neurologists  and  the 
rest  of  the  French  school  describe  hysteria  substantially  as  I  am  here 
describing  it. 


88     THE  FOUNDATIONS  OF  PERSONALITY 

ually.  Modern  neurology  soon  discovered  that  these 
paralyses  were  quite  unlike  those  seen  when  there  is 
"  real  "  injury  to  the  brain,  spinal  cord  or  the  peripheral 
nerves.  They  corresponded  to  the  layman's  idea  of  a 
part.  Thus  a  paralysis  of  the  arm  ends  at  the  shoulder, 
a  paralysis  of  the  feet  at  the  ankle,  and  in  ways  not 
necessary  to  detail  here  differ  from  what  occurs  when 
the  organic  structure  of  the  nervous  system  is  involved. 
For  example,  the  reflexes  in  hysteria  are  unaltered,  and 
stiffness  when  it  occurs  is  not  the  stiffness  of  organic 
disease.  If  a  neurologist  were  to  have  a  hysteric  paral- 
ysis a  very  interesting  problem  in  diagnosis  would  be 
presented. 

Further,  the  paralysis  yields  in  spectacular  fashion 
to  various  procedures  or  else  disappears  spontaneously 
in  remarkable  fashion  overnight.  Paralyses  of  this 
type  have  disappeared  under  hypnosis,  violent  electric 
shocks,  "  magical  "  liniments,  threats,  prayers,  the  heal- 
er's, the  fakir's,  the  doctor's  personal  influence;  under 
circumstances  of  danger  (a  fire,  a  row,  etc.) ;  by  pil- 
grimages to  Lourdes,  St.  Anne  de  Beaupre,  the  Temple 
of  Diana,  the  relic  of  a  saint;  by  the  influence  of  sud- 
den joy,  fear,  anger;  by  the  work  of  the  psychoanalyst 
and  by  that  of  the  osteopath!  Every  great  religious 
leader  and  every  savage  medicine  man  beating  a  tom- 
tom has  had  to  prove  his  pretensions  to  greatness  by 
healing  the  sick  —  so  intensely  practical  is  man  —  and 
he  has  proved  his  divinity  by  curing  the  hysterics,  so 
that  they  threw  away  their  crutches,  or  jumped  blithely 
out  of  bed,  or  used  their  arms,  perhaps  for  the  first  time 
in  years.  Hysteria  has  caused  more  talk  of  the  influence 
of  mind  over  body  than  all  other  manifestations  of  men- 
tal peculiarity  put  together.  Wherever  there  is  any- 
thing to  be  gained  by  hysteric  paralyses,  these  appear 


SUBCONSCIOUSNESS  AND  FREUDIANISM    89 

in  much  greater  frequency  than  under  ordinary  circum- 
stances. Thus  the  possibility  of  recovering  damages 
seems  to  play  a  role  in  bringing  about  a  paralysis  that 
defies  treatment  until  the  litigation  is  settled ;  similarly 
the  possibility  of  being  removed  from  the  fighting  line 
played  a  large  part  in  the  causation  of  war  hysteric 
paralysis. 

3.  A  group  of  sensory  phenomena  is  conspicuous  in 
hysteria,  sometimes  combined  with  the  paralyses  and 
attacks  but  often  existing  alone.  A  part  of  the  body  will 
become  curiously  insensitive  to  stimulation.  Thus  one 
may  thrust  a  pin  into  any  part  without  evoking  any 
pain  and  apparently  without  being  felt;  one  may  rub 
the  cornea  of  the  eye,  that  exquisitely  sensitive  part, 
without  arousing  a  reaction ;  one  may  push  a  throat  stick 
against  the  uvula  as  it  hangs  from  the  palate  without 
arousing  the  normal  and  very  lively  reflex  of  "  gag- 
ging." These  insensitive  areas,  known  as  stigmata, 
played  a  very  important  r61e  in  the  epidemic  of  witch- 
craft hunting  of  the  sixteenth  and  seventeenth  centuries, 
when  the  witch  was  so  diagnosed  if  she  felt  no  pain 
when  a  needle  was  thrust  into  her.  Mankind  has  often 
enough  worshiped  the  insane  and  mentally  aberrant 
and  has  as  often  been  diabolically  cruel  to  them. 

What  has  been  stated  of  the  paralyses  is  true  of  the 
insensitive  areas ;  they  correspond  to  an  idea  of  a  part 
and  not  to  an  anatomical  unit.  Thus  a  loss  of  sensa- 
tion will  reach  up  to  the  wrist  (glove  type)  all  around, 
front  and  back,  or  to  the  elbow  or  the  shoulder,  etc.  No 
organically  caused  anaesthetic  area  ever  does  this,  and 
so  the  neurologist  is  able,  usually,  to  separate  the  two 
conditions.  And  the  anaesthesias  yield  as  do  the  hys- 
teric paralyses  to  a  variety  of  agents,  from  prayer  and 
persuasion  to  a  bitter  tonic  or  a  blow.     I  confess  to  a 


90     THE  FOUNDATIONS  OF  PERSONALITY 

weird  feeling  in  the  presence  of  a  hysteric  whose  arm 
can  be  thrust  through  and  through  with  a  needle  with- 
out apparently  suffering  any  pain,  and  it  seems  to  me 
that  this  may  be  the  explanation  of  the  fortitude  of 
those  martyrs  who  have  astonished  and  sometimes  con- 
verted their  persecutors  by  their  sublime  resistance  to 
torture. 

There  has  been  described  as  part  of  hysteria  the  hys- 
teric temperament.  The  characteristics  of  this  tem- 
perament are  the  emotional  instability,  the  strong  desire 
for  sympathy,  the  effort  to  obtain  one's  desire  through 
weakness,  through  the  appeal  to  the  sympathy  of  others, 
an  irritable  egoism  never  satisfied  and  without  firm  pur- 
pose. It  is  true  that  the  majority  of  peace-time  hysterics 
show  this  peculiar  temperament,  but  it  is  also  true  that 
the  war-time  hysterics  often  enough  were  of  "  normal " 
character,  without  prior  evidence  of  weakness. 

As  I  before  mentioned,  Freud  became  greatly  inter- 
ested in  this  group  of  patients  and  especially  in  the 
female  patients,  since  in  ordinary  neurological  practice 
the  male  hysteric  is  not  common.  Out  of  his  experience 
and  effort  he  built  up  a  system  of  beliefs  and  treatment, 
the  evolution  of  which  is  interesting,  but  which  is  not 
here  important. 

At  the  present  time  the  Freudian  doctrine  hangs  on 
the  following  beliefs: 

1.  That  from  the  beginning  to  the  end  of  life  every 
thing  in  the  mental  activities  of  man  has  a  cause  and  l 
meaning,  and  that  these  causes  and  meanings  may  be 
traced  back  to  infancy.  No  slip  of  the  tongue  is  acci- 
dental; it  has  purpose  and  this  purpose  can  be  traced 
by  psychoanalysis.  So  with  hysteric  phenomena:  the 
paralyses,  the  sensory  changes,  all  the  queer  and  star- 


SUBCONSCIOUSNESS  AND  FREUDIANISM    91 

tling  things  represent  something  of  importance  and  of 
value  to  the  subconscious. 

2.  There  is  in  man  a  subconscious  mentality,  having 
wills,  purposes,  strivings,  desires,  passions.  These 
trends  are  the  raw,  native,  uninhibited  desires  of  man; 
they  are  our  lusts,  our  crude  unsocialized  desires,  aris- 
ing out  of  a  metaphysical,  undifferentiated  yearning 
called  libido.  In  the  Freudian  "  psychology  "  the  libido 
is  mainly  sex  desire  and  takes  the  form  of  homosexual 
feelings,  incest  feelings  (desire  for  the  father  or  for 
the  mother  —  the  CEdipus  complex),  desire  for  the  sis- 
ter or  brother.^  ( The  human  being,  according  to  Freud, 
goes  through  three  stages  in  his  sex  life:  first,  a  sex 
attachment  to  himself  marked  by  thumb  sucking,  mas- 
turbation, etc.,  second,  an  attachment  to  the  same  sex  — 
homosexuality  —  and,  finally,  the  attachment  or  desire 
for  the  opposite  sex.)  In  the  practical  application  of 
the  Freudian  psychology  to  the  patients  the  sex  conflicts 
(of  which  we  shall  speak  shortly)  are  all  important;  the 
subconsciousness  is  largely  taken  up  with  sex  and  with 
efforts  to  obtain  gratification  for  these  sex  desires. 

3.  But,  the  theory  continues,  the  conscious  personal- 
ity is  the  socialized  personality,  having  aims  and  ends 
not  consistent  with  desire  for  mother,  homosexual  crav- 
ings, lust  for  a  married  man  or  woman.  So  there  en- 
sues a  battle  between  desire  and  inhibition.  The  in- 
hibiting agent  is  a  something  called  the  censor,  who 
pushes  back  into  the  subconsciousness  the  socially  ta- 
booed, the  socially  abhorrent  desires;  represses  emo- 
tions and  instincts  that  are  socially  out  of  order.  But 
there  is  no  real  victory  for  the  consciousness,  for  the 

'The  Freudians  would  protest  against  this.  Libido  is  the  life  en- 
ergy,—  but  all  the  Freudian  analyses  of  actual  cases  published  make 
libido  sex,  and  usually  "perverse."  (I  put  the  perverse  in  quotations 
because  I  fear  to  be  called  prudish  by  Freudians. ) 


92    THE  FOUNDATIONS  OF  PERSONALITY 

complex  (the  name  given  to  a  desire  or  wish  with  its 
attendant  ideas,  emotions  and  motor  manifestations)  is 
still  active,  subconsciously  changing  the  life  of  the 
person,  causing  him  to  make  slips  in  his  speech,  express- 
ing itself  in  his  dreams  and  his  work,  and  if  sufficiently 
powerful,  giving  rise  to  nervous  or  mental  disease  of 
one  type  or  another.  Nothing  is  ever  forgotten,  accord- 
ing to  Freud,  and  the  reason  our  childhood  is  not  volun- 
tarily remembered  is  because  it  is  full  of  forbidden 
desires  and  curiosities  and  the  developing  censor  thrusts 
it  all  into  the  subconsciousness,  where  it  continues  to 
make  trouble  all  the  rest  of  the  individual's  life.  In 
fact,  a  cardinal  part  of  Freudianism  (which  he  and  his 
followers  are  lately  modifying)  is  that  it  is  the  results 
of  the  "  psychic  traumata  "  (psychical  injuries)  of  in- 
fancy and  childhood  that  cause  the  hysteria  of  the  adult ; 
and  these  psychical  traumata  are  largely  (about  ninety- 
nine  per  cent. )  sexual. 

4.  Freudianism  has  borrowed  the  time-honored  dic- 
tum that  every  sensation  has  a  natural  result  in  action 
and  has  elaborated  it  into  the  statement  that  every 
alfective  state,  every  desire  and  craving  of  whatever 
sort,  needs  a  motor  discharge,  an  avenue  of  outlet.  If 
the  desire  or  emotion  is  inhibited,  its  excitement  is  trans- 
ferred with  it  into  the  subconscious  and  that  excitement 
may  attach  itself  to  other  excitements  and  break  into 
consciousness  as  a  mental  disturbance  of  one  type  or 
another.  If  you  can  get  at  the  complex  by  psycho- 
analysis, by  dragging  it  to  the  light,  by  making  it  con- 
scious, you  discharge  the  excitement  and  health  is 
restored.  This  originally  was  very  important  in  the 
Freudian  work  and  was  called  by  the  crude  term  of 
catharsis. 

5.  How  can  one  get  at  these  subterranean  cravings 


SUBCONSCIOUSNESS  AND  FREUDIANISM    93 

and  strivings,  at  the  fact  that  originally  one  desired 
one's  mother  and  was  jealous  of  one's  father,  or  vice 
versa?  Here  Freud  developed  an  elaborate  technique 
based  on  the  following : 

Though  the  censor  sits  on  the  lid  of  the  subconscious- 
ness, that  wily  self  has  ways  and  means  of  expression. 
In  dreams,  in  humor,  in  the  slip  of  the  tongue,  in  for- 
getfulness,  in  myths  of  the  race,  in  the  symptoms  of  the 
hysteric  patient,  in  the  creations  of  writers  and  artists, 
the  subconsciousness  seeks  to  symbolize  in  innocent  (or 
acceptable)  form  its  crude  wishes.  By  taking  a  dream, 
for  example,  and  analyzing  it  by  what  is  known  as  the 
free  association  method,  one  discovers  the  real  meaning 
of  the  terms  used,  the  meaning  behind  the  symbol ;  and 
behind  the  apparent  dream-content  one  sees  revealed  the 
wishes  and  disorganizing  desires  of  the  subconscious  or 
the  real  person.  For  throughout  Freud's  work,  though 
not  so  definitely  expressed,  there  is  the  idea  that  the 
subconscious  is  by  far  the  most  important  part  of  the 
personality,  and  that  the  social  purposes,  the  moral  in- 
junctions and  feelings  are  not  the  real  purposes  and  real 
desires  of  the  real  personality. 

In  analyzing  dreams,  the  symbols  become  quite  stan- 
dardized. The  horses,  dogs,  beards,  queer  situations  of 
the  dream  (falling,  walking  without  clothes,  picking  up 
money,  etc. ) ,  the  demons,  ghosts,  flying,  relate  definitely 
to  sex  situations,  sex  organs,  sex  desires.  (The  Freud- 
ians are  apt  to  deny  this  theoretically,  but  practically 
every  dream  of  the  thousands  they  publish  is  a  sex  dream 
of  crude  content. )  Naturally  a  "  pure  "  girl  is  quite 
shocked  when  told  that  because  she  dreamed  she  was 
riding  a  gray  horse  in  a  green  meadow  that  she  really 
has  had  (and  still  is  troubled  by)  incestuous  desires  for 


94    THE  FOUNDATIONS  OF  PERSONALITY 

her  father,  but  that  is  the  way  to  cure  her  of  her  neuras- 
thenia or  fatigue  or  obsession  of  one  kind  or  other. 

I  have  not  attempted  a  detailed  account  of  the  tech- 
nique of  free  association,  nor  the  Freudian  account  of 
humor,  etc.  There  are  plenty  of  books  on  the  market 
written  by  Freud  himself  and  his  followers.  Frankly 
I  advise  the  average  person  not  to  read  them.  I  am 
opposed  to  the  Freudian  account  of  life  and  character, 
though  recognizing  that  he  has  caused  the  psychologist 
to  examine  life  with  more  realism,  to  strip  away  pre- 
tense, to  be  familiar  with  the  crude  and  to  examine 
conduct  with  the  microscope. 

I  do  not  believe  there  is  an  organized  subconscious- 
ness, having  a  personality.  Most  of  the  work  which 
proves  this  has  been  done  on  hysterics.  Hysterics  are 
usually  proficient  liars,  are  very  suggestible  and  quite 
apt  to  give  the  examiner  what  he  looks  for,  because  they 
seek  his  friendly  interest  and  eager  study.  Wherever  I 
have  checked  up  the  "  subconscious  "  facts  as  revealed 
by  the  patient  as  a  result  of  his  psychoanalysis  or 
through  hypnosis,  I  have  found  but  little  truth.  On  the 
other  hand,  the  Freudians  practically  never  check  up 
the  statements  of  their  patients;  if  a  woman  tells  all 
sorts  of  tales  of  her  husband's  attitude  toward  her,  or 
of  the  attitude  of  her  parents,  it  is  taken  for  granted 
that  she  tells  the  truth.  My  belief  is  that  had  the  state- 
ments of  Freud's  patients  been  carefully  investigated 
he  would  probably  never  have  evolved  his  theories. 

The  Freudians  have  made  no  consecutive  study  of 
normal  childhood,  though  they  lay  great  stress  on  this 
period  of  life  and  in  fact  trace  the  symptoms  of  their 
patients  back  to  "  infantile  trauma."  Most  of  Freud's 
ideas  on  sex  development  can  be  traced  to  the  one 
four-and-a-half-years-old  child  he  analyzed,  who  was  as 


SUBCONSCIOUSNESS  AND  FREUDIANISM     95 

representative  of  normal  childhood  as  the  little  chess 
champion  of  nine  years  now  astounding  the  world  is 
representative  of  the  chess  ability  of  the  average  child. 
Moreover,  the  basis  of  the  technique  is  the  free  associa- 
tion, an  association  released  from  inhibitions  of  all 
kinds.  There  isn't  any  such  thing,  as  Professor  Wood- 
worth  has  pointed  out.  All  associations  are  conditioned 
by  the  physical  condition  of  the  patient,  by  his  mood,  by 
the  nature  of  the  environment  he  finds  himself  in,  by  the 
personality  of  the  examiner  and  his  powers  of  suggest- 
ing, his  purposes  and  (very  important)  by  the  patient's 
purposes,  which  he  cannot  bid  "  Disappear !  "  As  for  the 
results  of  treatment,  every  neurologist  meets  patients 
again  and  again  who  have  been  "  psychoanalyzed  "  with- 
out results.  Moreover,  psychoneurotic  patients  get  well 
without  treatment,  as  do  all  other  classes  of  the  sick,  and 
the  Christian  Scientist,  the  osteopath  and  the  chiroprac- 
tic also  have  records  of  "  cures." 

This  is  not  the  place  to  discuss  in  further  detail  the 
Freudian  ideas  (the  wish,  the  symbol,  the  jargon  of 
transference,  etc).  The  leading  follower  of  Freud, 
Jung,  has  already  broken  away  from  the  parent  church, 
and  there  is  an  amusing  cry  of  heresy  raised.  Soon  the 
eminent  Austrian  will  have  the  pleasure  of  seeing  a 
half-dozen  schools  that  have  split  off  from  his  own, — 
followers  of  Bleuler,  Jung,  Adler  and  others. 

There  is  a  subconsciousness  in  that  much  of  the  nerv- 
ous activity  of  the  organism  has  but  little  or  no  relation 
to  consciousness.  There  are  mechanisms  laid  down  by 
heredity  and  by  the  racial  structure  that  accomplish 
great  functions  without  any  but  the  most  indirect  effect 
on  consciousness  and  without  any  control  by  the  con- 
scious personality.  We  are  spurred  on  to  sex  life,  to 
marriage,  to  the  care  of  our  children  by  instinct;  but 


96    THE  FOUNDATIONS  OF  PERSONALITY 

the  instinct  is  not  a  personality  any  more  than  the 
automatic  heartbeat  is.  We  repress  a  forbidden  desire ; 
if  we  are  successful  and  really  overcome  the  desire  by 
setting  up  new  desires  or  in  some  other  way,  the  in- 
hibited desire  is  not  locked  up  in  a  subterranean  limbo. 
There  is  nothing  pathological  about  inhibition,  for  in- 
hibition is  as  normal  a  part  of  character  as  desire,  and 
the  social  instinct  which  bids  us  inhibit  is  as  funda- 
mental as  the  sex  instinct.  Most  conflicts  are  on  a 
conscious  plane,  but  most  people  will  not  admit  to  any 
one  else  their  deeply  abhorrent  desires.  To  all  of  us, 
or  nearly  all,  come  desires  and  temptations  that  we 
would  not  acknowledge  for  the  world.  If  a  wise  exam- 
iner succeeds  in  getting  us  to  admit  them,  it  is  very 
agreeable  to  find  a  scapegoat  in  the  form  of  the  subcon- 
sciousness. I  have  often  said  this  to  students :  if  all  our 
thoughts  and  conscious  desires  could  be  exposed,  the 
most  of  us  would  almost  die  of  shame.  True,  we  do 
not  clearly  understand  ourselves  and  our  conflicts  and 
explanation  is  often  necessary,  but  that  is  not  equiva- 
lent to  the  subconsciousness ;  it  merely  means  that  intro- 
spection is  not  sagacious. 

Nor  is  it  true,  in  my  belief,  that  dreams  are  important 
psychical  events,  nor  that  the  subconsciousness  evades 
a  censor  in  elaborating  them.  To  what  end  would  that 
be  done?  What  would  be  the  use  of  it?  Suppose  that 
Freud  and  his  school  had  never  been ;  then  dreams  would 
always  be  useless,  for  they  would  have  no  interpreter. 
Men  have  dreamed  in  the  countless  ages  before  Freud 
was  born, —  in  vain.  Think  how  the  poor,  misguided 
subconsciousness  has  labored  for  nothing, —  and  how 
grateful  it  should  be  to  Freud !  Dreams  are  results  and 
have  the  same  kind  of  function  that  a  stomach-ache 
has. 


SUBCONSCIOUSNESS  AND  FREUDIANISM     97 

Things,  experiences  are  forgotten,  and  whether  they 
are  remembered  or  not  depends  upon  the  number  of 
times  they  are  experienced,  the  attention  they  are  given, 
the  use  they  are  put  to  and  the  quality  of  the  brain 
experiencing  them.  Disease  and  old  age  may  lower 
the  recording  power  of  the  brain  so  that  experiences 
and  sensations  do  not  stick,  and  now  and  then  the  brain 
is  hypermnesic  so  that  things  are  remembered  with 
surprising  ease.  • 

The  conflicts  of  life  are  generally  conscious  conflicts, 
in  my  experience.  Desires  and  lusts  that  one  does  not 
know  of  do  no  harm ;  it  is  the  conflict  which  we  cannot 
settle,  the  choice  we  cannot  make,  the  doubt  we  cannot 
resolve,  that  injures.  It  is  not  those  who  find  it  easy 
to  inhibit  a  desire  or  any  impulse  that  are  troubled, 
though  they  may  and  do  grow  narrow.  It  is  those  whose 
unlawful  or  discordant  desires  are  not  easily  inhibited 
who  find  themselves  the  theater  of  a  constant  struggle 
that  breaks  them  down.  The  uneasiness  of  a  desire 
that  arises  from  the  activity  of  the  sex  organs  is  not  a 
manifestation  of  a  subconscious  personality,  unless  we 
include  in  our  personality  our  livers,  spleen  and  inter- 
nal organs  of  all  kinds.  Such  an  uneasiness  may  not 
be  clearly  understood  by  the  individual  merely  because 
the  uneasiness  is  diffuse  and  not  localized.  But  there 
is  no  personality,  no  will,  wish  or  desire  in  that  un- 
easiness ;  it  may  and  does  cause  to  arise  in  the  conscious 
personality  wills  and  wishes  and  desires  against  which 
there  is  rebellion  and  because  of  which  there  is  con- 
flict. 

Upon  the  issue  of  the  conflicts  within  the  personality 
hangs  the  fate  of  the  individual.  Race-old  lines  of 
conduct  are  inhibited  by  custom,  tradition,  teaching, 


98    THE  FOUNDATIONS  OF  PERSONALITY 

conformity  and  the  social  instinct  and  its  allies.    Here 
is  a  subject  worthy  of  extended  consideration. 

Freud  has  done  the  thought  of  our  times  a  great 
service  in  emphasizing  conflict.  From  the  earliest  re- 
striction laid  by  men  on  his  own  conduct,  wrestling 
with  desire  and  temptation  has  been  the  greatest  of 
man's  struggles.  Internal  warfare  between  opposing 
purposes  and  desires  may  proceed  to  a  disruption  of 
the  personality,  to  failure  and  unhappiness,  or  else  to 
a  solidified  personality,  eflflcient,  single-minded  and  suc- 
cessful. Freud's  work  has  directed  our  attention  to 
the  thousand  and  one  aberrant  desires  that  we  will 
hardly  acknowledge  to  ourselves,  and  he  has  forced  the 
professional  worker  in  abnormal  and  normal  mental 
life  to  disregard  his  own  prejudices,  to  strip  away  the 
camouflage  that  we  put  over  our  motives  and  our  strug- 
gles. Together  with  Jung  and  Bleuler,  he  has  helped 
our  science  of  character  a  great  deal  through  no  other 
method  than  by  arousing  it  to  action  against  him.  In 
order  to  fight  him,  our  thought  has  been  forced  to  arm 
itself  with  the  weapons  that  he  has  used. 


CHAPTER  VI 

EMOTION,  INSTINCT,   INTELLIGENCE   AND  WILL 

In  a  preceding  chapter  we  discussed  man  as  an  organ- 
ism reacting  against  an  outside  world  and  spurred  on 
by  internal  activities  and  needs.  We  discussed  stimu- 
lation, reflexes,  inhibition,  choice  and  the  organizing 
activity,  memoiy  and  habit,  consciousness  and  subcon- 
sciousness, all  of  which  are  primary  activities  of  the 
organism.  But  these  are  mere  theories  of  function,  for 
the  activities  we  are  interested  in  reside  in  more  definite 
reactions,  of  which  the  foregoing  are  parts. 

We  see  a  dreaded  object  on  the  horizon  or  foresee  a 
calamity, —  and  we  fear.  That  state  of  the  organism 
(note  I  do  not  say  that  state  of  mind)  resulting  from 
the  vision  is  an  emotion.  We  fly  at  once,  we  hide,  and 
the  action  is  in  obedience  to  an  instinct.  But  ordi- 
narily we  do  not  fly  or  hide  haphazard;  we  think  of 
ways  and  means,  if  only  in  a  rudimentary  fashion ;  we 
shape  plans,  perhaps  as  we  fly;  we  pick  up  a  stick  on 
the  run,  hoping  to  escape  but  preparing  for  the  reaction 
of  fight  if  cornered.  "  What  shall  I  do  —  what  shall 
I  do?  finds  no  conscious  answer  if  the  emotion  is 
overwhelming  or  the  instinctive  flight  a  pell-mell  affair ; 
but  ordinarily*  memories  of  other  experiences  or  of 
teaching  come  into  the  mind  and  some  effort  is  made 
to  meet  the  situation  in  an  "  intelligent "  manner. 

Here,  then,  is  a  response  in  which  three  cardinal  reac- 
tions have  occurred  and  are  blended, —  the  emotion,  the 
instinctive  action,  and  the  intelligent  action ;  or  to  make 


100  THE  FOUNDATIONS  OF  PERSONALITY 

abstractions,  emotion,  instinct  and  intelligence.  (Per- 
sonally, I  think  half  the  trouble  with  our  thought  is 
that  we  abstract  from  our  experiences  a  common  group 
of  associations  and  believe  that  the  abstraction  has 
some  existence  outside  our  thoughts. )  Thus  there  arise 
in  us,  as  a  result  of  things  experienced,  curious  feel- 
ings and  we  speak  of  the  feelings  as  emotions;  we 
make  a  race-old  response  to  a  situation, —  an  instinctive 
reaction;  our  memories,  past  experiences  and  present 
purposes  are  stirred  into  activity,  and  we  plan  and 
scheme,  and  this  is  an  intelligent  reaction,  but  there 
is  in  reality  no  metaphysical  entity  Emotion,  Instinct, 
Intelligence.  I  believe  that  here  the  philosophers  whose 
mental  activities  are  essentially  in  the  direction  of 
forming  abstract  ideas  have  misled  us. 

What  I  wish  to  point  out  is  this:  that  to  any  situa- 
tion all  three  reactions  may  take  place  and  modify  one 
another.  We  are  insulted  —  some  one  slaps  our  face  — 
the  fierce  emotion  of  anger  arises  and  through  us  surge 
waves  of  feeling  manifested  on  the  motor  side  by  tensed 
muscles,  rapid  heart,  harsh  breathing,  perhaps  a  gen- 
eral reddening  of  face  and  eyes.  Instinctively  our  fists 
are  clenched,  a  part  of  the  reaction  of  fight,  and  it  needs 
but  the  slightest  increase  of  anger  to  send  us  leaping 
on  the  aggressor,  to  fight  him  perhaps  to  the  death. 
But  no, —  the  situation  has  aroused  certain  memories 
and  certain  inhibitions :  the  one  who  struck  us  has  been 
our  friend  and  we  can  see  that  he  is  acting  under  a 
mistaken  impression,  or  else  we  perceive  that  he  is 
right,  that  we  have  done  him  a  wrong  for  which  his 
blow  is  a  sort  of  just  reaction.  We  are  checked  by  these 
cerebral  activities,  we  choose  some  other  reaction  than 
fight ;  perhaps  we  prevent  him  from  further  assault,  or 
we  turn  and  walk  away,  or  we  start  to  explain,  to  mol- 


INTELLIGENCE  AND  WILL  101 

lify  and  console,  or  to  remonstrate  and  reprove.  In 
other  words,  "  intelligence  "  steps  in  to  inhibit,  to  bring 
to  the  surface  the  possibilities,  to  choose,  and  thus  over- 
rides the  emotional  instinctive  reaction.  It  may  not 
succeed  in  the  overriding ;  we  may  hesitate,  inhibit,  etc., 
for  only  a  second  or  so,  before  hot  anger  overcomes  us, 
and  the  instinctive  response  of  fight  and  retaliation 
takes  place. 

These  examples  might  be  multiplied  a  thousandfold. 
Every  day  of  our  lives  situations  come  up  in  which 
there  is  a  blending  or  an  antagonism  between  emotional, 
instinctive  and  intelligent  responses.  In  fact,  very  few 
acts  of  the  organized  human  being  are  anything  else. 
For  every  emotion  awakens  memories  of  past  emotions 
and  the  consequences;  every  instinct  is  hampered  by 
other  instincts  or  by  the  inhibitions  aroused  by  ob- 
stacles; and  intelligence  continually  struggles  against 
emotion  and  blind  instinct.  Teaching,  experience, 
knowledge,  all  modify  emotional  and  instinctive  re- 
sponses so  that  sometimes  they  are  hardly  recognizable 
as  such.  On  the  other  hand,  though  intelligence 
normally  occupies  the  seat  of  power,  it  is  easily  ousted 
and  in  reality  only  steers  and  directs  the  vehicle  of  life, 
choosing  not  the  goal  but  the  road  by  which  the  goal 
can  safely  be  reached. 

In  general  terms  we  shall  define  emotions,  instincts 
and  intelligence  as  follows: 

1.  For  emotions  we  shall  accept  a  modified  James- 
Lange  theory,  supplementing  it  by  the  developments 
of  science  since  their  day.  When  a  thing  is  seen  or 
heard  (or  smelled  or  tasted  or  thought),  it  arouses  an 
emotion;  that  emotion  consists  of  at  least  three  parts. 
First,  the  arousal  of  memories  and  experiences  that 
give  it  a  value  to  the  individual,  make  it  a  desired 


102  THE  FOUNDATIONS  OF  PERSONALITY 

object  or  a  dreaded,  distasteful  object.  Second,  at  the 
same  time,  or  shortly  preceding  or  succeeding  this,  a 
great  variety  of  changes  takes  place  in  the  organism, 
changes  that  we  shall  call  the  vaso-visceral-motor 
changes.  This  means  merely  that  there  is  a  series  of 
reactions  set  up  in  the  sympathetic  nervous  system,  in 
the  blood  vessels  and  bodily  structures  they  control  and 
in  the  glands  of  internal  secretion, —  changes  which 
include  the  blush  or  the  pallor,  the  rapid  heartbeat,  the 
quickened  or  labored  breathing,  the  changes  in  the 
digestive  tract  which  include  the  vomiting  of  disgust 
and  the  diarrhoea  of  fear;  the  changes  that  passion 
brings  in  the  male  and  the  female  and  many  other  altera- 
tions to  be  discussed  again.  Third,  there  is  then  the 
feeling  of  these  coensesthetic  changes, —  a  feeling  of 
pleasantness,  unpleasantness  mingled  with  the  basic 
feeling  of  excitement,  and  from  then  on  that  situation 
is  linked  in  memory  with  the  feeling  that  we  usually 
call  the  emotion  but  which  is  only  a  part  of  it.  Never- 
theless, it  becomes  the  part  longed  for  or  thereafter 
avoided;  it  is  the  value  of  the  emotion  to  us,  as  con- 
scious personalities,  although  it  may  be  a  false,  disas- 
trous, dangerous  value.  Excitement  is  the  generalized 
mood  change  that  results  in  consciousness  in  conse- 
quence of  the  vaso-visceral-motor  changes  of  emotion; 
it  is  therefore  based  on  bodily  changes  as  is  the  feeling, 
pleasant  or  unpleasant,  that  also  occurs.  William  James 
said  that  we  laugh  and  are  therefore  happy;  we  weep 
and  are  therefore  sad;  the  bodily  changes  are  primary 
and  the  feeling  secondary.  We  do  not  accept  this  dic- 
tum entirely,  but  we  say  that  the  organism  reacts  in 
a  complicated  way  and  that  the  feeling  —  sadness,  dis- 
gust, anger,  joy  —  springs  from  the  memories  and  past 
experiences  aroused  by  a  situation  as  well  as  from  the 


INTELLIGENCE  AND  WILL  103 

widespread  bodily  excitement  also  so  aroused.  For  the 
neurologist  both  the  cerebral  and  the  sympathetic- 
endocrinal  components  of  emotion  are  important. 

For  the  moment  we  turn  to  instinct  and  instinctive 
reactions. 

2.  Man  has  always  wondered  that  things  can  be 
known  without  teaching.  So  slow  and  painful  is  the 
process  of  mastering  a  technique,  whether  of  handi- 
craf  tsmanship  or  of  art,  so  imbued  are  we  with  the  need 
of  education  for  the  acquirement  of  knowledge,  that  we 
are  taken  aback  by  the  realization  that  all  around  us 
are  creatures  carrying  on  the  most  elaborate  technique, 
going  through  the  most  complicated  procedures  and  ap- 
parently possessed  of  the  surest  knowledge  without  the 
possibility  of  teaching.  The  flight  of  birds,  the  ob- 
stetric and  nursing  procedures  of  all  animals,  and  espe- 
cially the  complicated  and  systematized  labors  of  bees, 
ants  and  other  insects,  have  aroused  the  wonder,  admira- 
tion and  awe  of  scientists.  A  chick  pecks  its  way  out 
of  its  egg  and  shakes  itself, —  then  immediately  starts 
on  the  trail  of  food  and  usually  needs  no  instruction 
as  to  diet.  The  female  insect  lays  its  eggs,  the  male 
insect  fertilizes  them,  the  progeny  go  through  the  states 
of  evolution  leading  to  adult  life  without  teaching  and 
without  the  possibility  of  previous  experience.  Since 
the  parent  never  sees  the  progeny,  and  the  progeny 
assume  various  shapes  and  have  very  varied  capacities 
at  these  times,  there  can  be  no  possible  teaching  of  what 
is  remarkably  skillful  and  marvelously  adapted  con- 
duct.i 

*  The  nature  of  instinct  has  been  a  subject  of  discussion  for  cen- 
turies, but  it  is  only  within  the  last  fifty  years  or  thereabouts  that 
instinctive  actions  have  really  been  studied.  I  refer  the  reader  to  the 
works  of  Darwin,  Romanes,  Lloyd  Morgan,  the  Peckhams,  Fabr6, 
Hobhouse,  and  McDougall  for  details  as  to  the  controversies  and  the 
facts  obtained. 


104  THE  FOUNDATIONS  OF  PERSONALITY 

Herbert  Spencer  considered  the  instinct  as  a  series 
of  inevitable  reflexes.  The  carrion  fly,  when  gravid, 
deposits  her  eggs  in  putrid  meat  in  order  that  the 
larvae  may  have  appropriate  food,  although  she  never 
sees  the  larvae  or  cannot  know  through  experience  their 
needs.  "  The  smell  of  putrid  meat  attracts  the  gravid 
carrion  fly.  That  is,  it  sets  up  motions  of  the  wings 
which  bring  the  fly  to  it,  and  the  fly  having  arrived,  the 
smell  and  the  contact  combined  stimulate  the  functions 
of  oviposition."  ^  But  as  all  the  critics  have  pointed 
out,  the  theory  of  compound  reflex  action  leaves  out  of 
account  that  there  are  any  number  of  stimuli  pouring 
in  on  the  carrion  fly  at  the  same  time  that  the  meat 
attracts  her.  The  real  mystery  lies  in  that  internal 
condition  which  makes  the  smell  of  the  meat  act  so 
inevitably. 

In  fact,  it  is  this  internal  condition  in  the  living 
creature  that  is  the  most  important  single  link  in  in- 
stinct. In  the  non-mating  season  the  sight  of  the 
female  has  no  effect  on  the  male.  But  periodically  his 
internal  organs  become  tense  with  procreative  cells; 
these  change  his  coenaesthesia ;  that  starts  desire,  and 
desire  sets  going  the  mechanisms  of  search,  courtship, 
the  sexual  act  and  the  care  of  the  female  while  she  is 
gravid.  All  instinctive  acts  have  back  of  them  either 
a  tension  or  a  deficit  of  some  kind  or  other,  brought 
about  by  the  awakening  of  function  of  some  glandular 
structure,  so  that  the  organism  becomes  ready  to  re- 
spond to  some  appropriate  outside  stimulus  and  inac- 
cessible to  others.  During  the  mating  season,  with 
certain  animals,  the  stimulus  of  food  has  no  effect  until 
there  is  effected  the  purposes  of  the  sexual  hunger. 
Changes  in  the  body  due  to  the  activity  of  sex  glands 

*  Hobbouse. 


INTELLIGENCE  AND  WILL  105 

or  gastric  juices  or  any  other  organic  product  have  two 
effects.  They  increase  the  stimulation  that  comes  from 
the  thing  sought  and  decrease  the  stimulation  that 
comes  from  other  things.  In  physiological  language, 
the  threshold  for  the  first  is  lowered  and  for  the  other 
it  is  raised. 

But  this  does  not  explain  how  the  changes  in  glands 
make  the  animal  seek  this  or  that,  except  by  saying  that 
the  animal  has  hereditary  structures  all  primed  to  ex- 
plode in  the  right  way.  We  may  fall  back  on  Berg- 
son's  mystical  idea  that  all  life  is  a  unity,  and  that  in- 
stinct, which  makes  one  living  thing  know  what  to  do 
with  another  —  to  kill  it  in  a  scientific  way  for  the 
good  of  the  posterity  of  the  killer  —  is  merely  the  knowl- 
edge, unconscious,  that  life  has  of  life.  That  pleasant 
explanation  projects  us  back  to  a  darker  problem  than 
ever:  how  life  knows  life  and  why  one  part  of  life  so 
obviously  seeks  to  circumvent  the  purpose  of  another 
part  of  life. 

For  us  it  is  best  to  say  that  instinct  arises  out  of 
the  racial  and  individual  needs;  that  physically  there 
occur  changes  in  the  glands  and  tissues ;  that  these  set 
up  desires  which  arouse  into  action  simple  or  elaborate 
mechanisms  which  finally  satisfy  the  need  of  the  organs 
and  tissues.^ 

Even  in  the  low  forms  of  life  instincts  are  not  per- 
fect at  the  start,  or  perfect  in  details,  and  almost  every 
member  of  a  species  will  show  individuality  in  dealing 
with  an  obstacle  to  an  instinctive  action.  In  other 
words,  though  there  is  instinct  and  this  furnishes  the 

^  Kempf  in  his  book  on  the  vegetative  nervous  system  goes  into  great 
detail  the  way  the  visceral  needs  force  the  animal  or  human  to 
satisfy  them.  Life  is  a  sort  of  war  between  the  vegetative  and  the 
central  nervous  system.  There  is  just  enough  truth  in  this  point  of 
view  to  make  it  very  entertaining. 


106  THE  FOUNDATIONS  OF  PERSONALITY 

basis  for  action  in  the  lowest  forms  of  life,  there  is  also 
the  capacity  for  learning  by  experience, —  and  this  is 
Intelligence.  "  The  basis  of  instinct  is  heredity  and 
we  can  impute  an  action  to  pure  instinct  only  if  it  is 
hereditary.  The  other  class  of  actions  are  those  devised 
by  the  individual  animal  for  himself  on  the  basis  of  his 
own  experience  and  these  are  called  generally  intelli- 
gent. Of  intelligence  operating  within  the  sphere  of 
instinct  there  is  ample  evidence.  There  are  modifica- 
tions of  instinctive  action  directly  traceable  to  experi- 
ence which  cannot  be  explained  by  the  interaction  of 
purely  hereditary  tendencies  and  there  are  cases  in 
which  the  whole  structure  of  the  instinct  is  profoundly 
modified  by  the  experience  of  the  individual."  Hob- 
house,  whom  I  quote,  goes  on  to  give  many  examples  of 
instinctive  action  modified  by  experience  and  intelli- 
gence in  the  insect  and  lower  animal  world. 

What  I  wish  especially  to  point  out  is  that  man  has 
many  instinctive  bases  for  conduct,  but  instincts  as 
such  are  not  often  seen  in  pure  form  in  man.  They  are 
constantly  modified  by  other  instincts  and  through  them 
runs  the  influence  of  intelligence.  The  function  of  in- 
telligence is  to  control  instincts,  to  choose  ways  and 
means  for  the  fulfillment  of  instincts  that  are  blocked, 
etc.  Moreover,  the  effects  of  teachings,  ethics,  social 
organization  and  tradition,  operating  through  the  social 
instincts,  are  to  repress,  inhibit  and  whip  into  con- 
formity every  mode  of  instinctive  conduct.  The  main 
instincts  are  those  relating  to  nutrition  and  reproduc- 
tion, the  care  of  the  young,  to  averting  danger  or  de- 
stroying it,  to  play  and  organized  activity,  to  acquiring, 
perhaps  to  teaching  and  learning  and  to  the  social  rela- 
tions generally.     But  manners  creep  in  to  regulate  our 


INTELLIGENCE  AND  WILL  107 

methods  of  eating  and  the  things  we  shall  eat ;  and  we 
may  not  eat  at  all  unless  we  agree  to  get  the  things  to 
eat  a  certain  way.  We  may  not  cohabit  except  under 
tremendous  restriction,  and  marriage  with  its  aims  and 
purposes  is  sexual  in  origin  but  modified  largely  and 
almost  beyond  recognition  by  social  consideration, 
taste,  esthetic  matters,  taboos  and  economic  conditions. 
We  may  not  treat  our  enemy  as  instinct  bids  us  do, — 
for  only  in  war  may  one  kill  and  here  one  kills  without 
any  personal  purpose  or  anger,  almost  without  instinct. 
We  may  be  compelled  through  social  exigencies  to  treat 
our  enemy  politely,  eat  with  him,  sleep  with  him  and 
help  him  out  of  difflculties  and  thus  completely  thwart 
one  instinctive  set  of  reactions.  Play  becomes  regu- 
lated by  rules  and  customs,  becomes  motivated  by  the 
desire  for  superiority,  or  the  desire  for  gain,  and  may 
even  leave  the  physical  field  entirely  and  become  purely 
mental.  And  so  on.  It  does  no  special  practical  good 
to  discuss  instincts  as  if  they  operated  in  man  as  such. 
They  become  purposes.  Therefore  we  shall  defer  the 
consideration  of  instincts  and  purposes  in  detail  until 
later  chapters  of  this  book. 

Since  instincts  are  too  rigid  to  meet  the  needs  of 
the  social  and  traditional  life  of  man,  they  become  in- 
tellectualized  and  socialized  into  purposes  and  ambi- 
tions, sometimes  almost  beyond  recognition.  Neverthe- 
less, the  driving  force  of  instinct  is  behind  every  pur- 
pose, every  ambition,  even  though  the  individual  himself 
has  not  the  slightest  idea  of  the  force  that  is  at  work. 
This  does  not  mean  that  instinct  acts  as  a  sort  of  cellar- 
plotter,  roving  around  in  a  subconsciousness,  or  at  least 
no  such  semi-diabolical  personality  need  be  postulated, 
any  more  than  it  need  be  postulated  for  the  automatic 


108  THE  FOUNDATIONS  OF  PERSONALITY 

mechanism  that  regulates  heartbeat  or  digestion.  The 
organic  tensions  and  depressions  that  constitute  instinct 
are  not  conscious  or  subconscious;  they  affect  our  con- 
scious personalities  so  that  we  desire  something,  we  fit 
that  desire  in  with  the  rest  of  our  desires,  we  seek  the 
means  of  gratifying  that  desire  first  in  accordance  with 
means  that  Nature  has  given  us  and  second  in  accord- 
ance with  social  teaching  and  our  intelligence.  If  the 
desire  brings  us  sharply  in  contact  with  obstacles  im- 
posed either  by  circumstances  or  more  precious  desire, 
we  inhibit  that  desire, —  and  thus  the  instinct.  Because 
organic  tensions  and  depressions  are  periodic  and  are 
dependent  upon  the  activities  of  glands  and  tissues  not 
within  our  control,  the  desires  may  never  be  completely 
squelched  and  may  arise  as  often  as  some  outer  stimulus 
brings  them  into  activity,  to  plague  and  disorder  the 
life  of  the  conscious  personality. 

3.  With  this  preliminary  consideration  of  instinct, 
we  pass  on  to  certain  of  the  phases  of  intelligence.  How 
to  define  intelligence  is  a  difficulty  best  met  by  ignoring 
definition.  But  this  much  is  true :  that  the  prime  func- 
tion of  intelligence  is  to  store  up  the  past  and  present 
experiences  so  that  they  can  be  used  in  the  future,  and 
that  it  adds  to  the  rigid  mechanism  of  instinct  a  plastic 
force  which  by  inhibiting  and  exciting  activity  accord- 
ing to  need  steers  the  organism  through  intricate  chan- 
nels. 

Instinct,  guided  by  a  plan,  conveniently  called  Na- 
ture's plan,  is  not  itself  a  planner.  The  discharge  of  one 
mechanism  discharges  another  and  so  on  through  a 
series  until  an  end  is  reached, —  an  end  apparently  not 
foreseen  by  the  organism  but  acting  for  the  good  of  the 
race  to  which  the  organism  belongs.     Intelligence,  often 


INTELLIGENCE  AND  WILL  109 

enough  not  conscious  of  the  plans  of  Nature,^  indeed, 
decidedly  ignorant  of  these  plans,  works  for  some  good 
established  by  itself  out  of  stimuli  set  up  by  the  in- 
stincts. It  plans,  looks  backward  and  forward,  reaches 
the  height  of  reflecting  on  itself,  gets  to  recognize  the 
existence  of  instinct  and  sets  itself  the  task  of  con- 
trolling instinct.  Often  enough  it  fails,  instinct  breaks 
through,  takes  possession  of  the  means  of  achievement, 
accomplishes  its  purpose  —  but  the  failure  of  intelli- 
gence to  control  and  the  misguided  control  it  attempts 
and  assumes  are  merely  part  of  the  general  imperfec- 
tions of  the  organism.  A  perfect  intelligence  would  be 
clearly  able  to  understand  its  instincts,  to  give  each  of 
them  satisfaction  by  a  perfect  compromise,  would  pick 
the  methods  for  accomplishment  without  error,  and 
storing  up  the  past  experiences  without  loss,  would  meet 
the  future  according  to  a  plan. 

As  we  study  the  nervous  systems  of  animals,  we  find 
that  with  the  apparent  growth  of  intelligence  there  is 
a  development  of  that  part  of  the  brain  called  the  cere- 
brum. In  so  far  as  certain  other  parts  of  the  brain  are 
concerned  —  medulla,  pons,  mid-brain,  basal  ganglia 
cerebellum  —  we  who  are  human  are  not  essentially 

*We  are  at  this  stage  in  a  very  dark  place  in  human  thought.  We 
say  that  instincts  seek  the  good  of  the  race,  or  have  some  racial  pur- 
pose, as  the  sexual  instinct  has  procreation  as  its  end.  But  the  lover 
wooing  his  sweetheart  has  no  procreation  plan  in  his  mind;  he  is 
urged  on  by  a  desire  to  win  this  particular  girl,  a  desire  which  is  in 
part  sexual,  in  part  admiration  of  her  beauty,  grace,  and  charm; 
again  it  is  the  pride  of  possession  and  achievement;  and  further  is  the 
result  of  the  social  and  romantic  ideals  taught  in  books,  theaters,  etc. 
He  may  not  have  the  slightest  desire  for  a  child ;  as  individual  he  plans 
one  thing, —  but  we  who  watch  him  see  in  his  approach  the  racial 
urge  for  procreation  and  even  disregard  his  purposes  as  unimportant. 
Who  and  what  is  the  Race,  where  does  it  reside,  how  can  it  have 
purposes  ?  Call  it  Nature,  and  we  are  no  better  off.  We  must  fall  back 
on  an  ancient  personalization  of  forces,  and  our  minds  rest  easier  when 
we  think  of  a  Planner  operating  in  all  of  us  and  perhaps  smiling  as  He 
witnesses  our  strivings. 


110  THE  FOUNDATIONS  OF  PERSONALITY 

superior  to  the  dog,  the  cow,  the  elephant  or  the  mon- 
key. But  when  the  neopallium,  or  the  cerebrum,  is 
considered,  the  enormous  superiority  of  man  (and  the 
superiority  of  the  higher  over  the  lower  animals)  be- 
comes striking.  Anatomically  the  cerebrum  is  a  com- 
plex elaboration  of  cells  and  fibers  that  have  these  main 
purposes :  First,  to  record  in  perfect  and  detailed  fash- 
ion the  experiences  of  the  organism,  so  that  here  are 
memory  centers  for  visual  and  auditory  experiences, 
for  skin,  joint  and  bone  experiences  of  all  kinds,  speech 
memories,  action  memories,  and  undoubtedly  for  the 
recording  in  some  way  not  understood  of  the  pleasure- 
pain  feelings.  Second,  it  has  a  hold,  a  grip  on  the 
motor  mechanism  of  the  body,  on  the  muscles  that  pro- 
duce action,  so  that  the  intelligence  can  nicely  adapt 
movement  to  the  circumstances,  to  purpose,  and  can 
inhibit  the  movements  that  arise  reflexly.  Thus  in  cer- 
tain diseases,  where  the  part  of  the  brain  involved  in 
movement  is  injured,  voluntary  movement  disappears 
but  reflex  action  is  increased.  Third,  the  neopallium, 
or  cerebrum,  is  characterized  by  what  are  known  as 
association  tracts,  i.e.,  connections  of  intricate  kinds 
which  link  together  areas  of  the  brain  having  different 
functions  and  thus  allow  for  combinations  of  activity 
of  all  kinds.  The  brain  thus  acts  to  increase  the  memo- 
ries of  the  past,  and,  as  we  all  know,  man  is  probably 
the  only  animal  to  whom  the  past  is  a  controlling  force, 
sometimes  even  an  overpowering  force.  It  acts  to  con- 
trol the  conduct  of  the  individual,  to  delay  or  to  inhibit 
it,  and  it  acts  to  increase  in  an  astonishing  manner  the 
number  of  reactions  possible.  One  stimulus  arousing 
cerebral  excitement  may  set  going  mechanisms  of  the 
brain  through  associated  tracts  that  will  produce  con- 
duct of  one  kind  or  another  for  years  to  come. 


INTELLIGENCE  AND  WILL  111 

We  spoke  in  a  previous  chapter  of  choice  as  an  inte- 
gral function  of  the  organism.  While  choice,  when  two 
competing  stimuli  awake  competing  mechanisms,  may 
be  non-cerebral  in  its  nature,  largely  speaking  it  is  a 
function  of  the  cerebrum,  of  the  intelligence.  To  choose 
is  a  constant  work  of  the  intelligence,  just  as  to  doubt 
is  an  unavailing  effort  to  find  a  choice.  Choice  blocked 
is  doubt,  one  of  the  unhappiest  of  mental  states.  I 
shall  not  pretend  to  solve  the  mystery  of  who  chooses, — 
what  chooses;  perhaps  there  is  a  constant  immortal 
ego;  perhaps  there  is  built  up  a  series  of  permanently 
excited  areas  which  give  rise  to  ego  feeling  and  pre- 
dominate in  choice ;  perhaps  competing  mechanisms,  as 
they  struggle  (in  Sherrington's  sense)  for  motor  path- 
ways, give  origin  to  the  feeling  of  choice.  At  any  rate, 
because  we  choose  is  the  reason  that  the  concept  of  will 
has  arisen  in  the  minds  of  both  philosopher  and  the 
man  in  the  street,  and  much  of  our  feeling  of  worth, 
individuality  and  power  —  mental  factors  of  huge  im- 
portance in  character  —  arises  from  the  power  to 
choose.  Choice  is  influenced  by  —  or  it  is  a  net  result 
of  —  the  praise  and  blame  of  others,  conscience,  mem- 
ory, knowledge  of  the  past,  plans  for  the  future.  It  is 
the  fulcrum  point  of  conduct! 

That  animals  have  intelligence  in  the  sense  in  which 
I  have  used  the  term  is  without  doubt.  No  one  who 
reads  the  work  of  Morgan,  the  Peckhams,  Fabre,  Hob- 
house  and  other  recent  investigators  of  the  instincts 
can  doubt  it.  Whether  animals  think  in  anything  like 
the  form  our  thought  takes  is  another  matter.  We  are 
so  largely  verbal  in  thought  that  speech  and  the  capacity 
to  speak  seem  intimately  related  to  thought.  For  the 
mechanics  of  thought,  for  the  laws  of  the  association 
of  ideas,  the  reader  is  referred  to  the  psychologists. 


112  THE  FOUNDATIONS  OF  PERSONALITY 

That  minds  differ  according  to  whether  they  habitually 
follow  one  type  of  associations  or  another  is  an  old  story. 
The  most  annoying  individual  in  the  world  is  the  one 
whose  associations  are  unguided  by  a  controlling  pur- 
pose, who  rambles  along  misdirected  by  sound  associa- 
tions or  by  accidental  resemblances  in  structure  of 
words,  or  by  remote  meanings, —  who  starts  off  to  tell 
you  that  she  (the  garrulous  old  lady)  went  to  the  store 
to  get  some  eggs,  that  she  has  a  friend  in  the  country 
whose  boy  is  in  the  army  (aren't  the  Germans  dreadful, 
she's  glad  she's  born  in  this  country),  city  life  is  very 
hard,  it  isn't  so  healthy  as  the  country,  thank  God  her 
health  is  good,  etc.,  etc.,"  and  she  never  arrives  at  the 
grocery  store  to  buy  the  eggs.  The  organizing  of  the 
associations  through  a  goal  idea  is  part  of  that  organ- 
izing energy  of  the  mind  and  character  previously 
spoken  of.  The  mind  tends  automatically  to  follow  the 
stimuli  that  reach  it,  but  the  organizing  energy  has  as 
one  of  its  functions  the  preventing  of  this,  and  con- 
trolled thinking  follows  associations  that  are,  as  it 
were,  laid  down  by  the  goal.  In  fatigue,  in  illness,  in 
certain  of  the  mental  diseases,  the  failure  of  the  organ- 
izing energy  brings  about  failure  "  to  concentrate  "  and 
the  tyranny  of  casual  associations  annoys  and  angers. 
The  stock  complaint  of  the  neurasthenic  that  everything 
distracts  his  attention  is  a  reversion  back  to  the  unor- 
ganized conditions  of  childhood,  with  this  essential  dif- 
ference: that  the  neurasthenic  rebels  against  his 
difficulty  in  thinking,  whereas  the  child  has  no  rebellion 
against  that  which  is  his  normal  state.  Minds  differ 
primarily  and  hugely  in  their  power  of  organizing  ex- 
perience, in  so  studying  and  recording  the  past  that  it 
becomes  a  guide  for  the  future.  Basic  in  this  is  the 
power  of  resisting  the  irrelevant  association,  of  check- 


INTELLIGENCE  AND  WILL  113 

ing  those  automatic  mental  activities  that  tend  to  be 
stirred  up  by  each  sound,  each  sight,  smell,  taste  and 
touch.  The  man  whose  task  has  no  appeal  for  him  has 
to  fight  to  keep  his  mind  on  it,  and  there  are  other 
people,  the  so-called  absent-minded,  who  are  so  over- 
concentrated,  so  wedded  to  a  goal  in  thought,  that  lesser 
matters  are  neither  remembered  nor  noticed.  In  its 
excess  overconcentration  is  a  handicap,  since  it  robs 
one  of  that  alertness  for  new  impressions,  new  sources 
of  thought  so  necessary  for  growth.  The  fine  mind  is 
that  which  can  pursue  successfully  a  goal  in  thought 
but  which  picks  en  route  to  that  goal,  out  of  the  irrele- 
vant associations,  something  that  enriches  its  conclu- 
sions. 

Not  often  enough  is  mechanical  skill,  hand-minded- 
ness,  considered  as  one  of  the  prime  phases  of  intelli- 
gence. Intelligence,  en  route  to  the  conquest  of  the 
world,  made  use  of  that  marvelous  instrument,  the 
human  hand,  which  in  its  opposable  thumb  and  little 
finger  sharply  separates  man  from  the  rest  of  creation. 
Studying  causes  and  effects,  experimenting  to  produce 
efifect,  the  hand  became  the  principal  instrument  in  in- 
vestigation, and  the  prime  verifier  of  belief.  "  Seeing 
is  believing  "  is  not  nearly  so  accurate  as  "  Handling 
is  believing,"  for  there  is  in  touch,  and  especially  in 
touch  of  the  hands  and  in  the  arm  movements,  a  Reality 
component  of  the  first  magnitude.  But  not  only  in 
touching  and  investigating,  but  in  pushing  and  pulling 
and  striking,  in  causing  change,  does  the  hand  become 
the  symbol  and  source  of  power  and  efficiency.  Un- 
doubtedly this  phase  of  the  hands'  activities  remained 
predominant  for  untold  centuries,  during  which  man 
made  but  slow  progress  in  his  career  toward  the  lead- 
ership of  the  world.       Then  came  the  phase  of  tool- 


114  THE  FOUNDATIONS  OF  PERSONALITY 

making  and  using  and  with  that  a  rush  of  events  that 
built  the  cities,  bridged  the  waters,  opened  up  the  Little 
and  the  Big  as  sources  of  knowledge  and  energy  for 
man  and  gave  him  the  power  which  he  has  used, —  but 
poorly.  It  is  the  skill  of  human  hands  upon  which  the 
mind  of  man  depends;  though  we  fly  through  the  air 
and  speed  under  water,  some  one  has  made  the  tools 
that  made  the  machine  we  use.  Therefore,  the  mechani- 
cal skill  of  man,  the  capacity  to  shape  resisting  material 
to  purpose,  the  power  of  the  detailed  applications  of 
the  principles  of  movement  and  force  are  high,  special 
functions  of  the  intelligence.  That  people  differ  enor- 
mously in  this  skill,  that  it  is  not  necessarily  associated 
with  other  phases  of  intelligence  are  commonplaces. 
The  dealer  in  abstract  ideas  of  great  value  to  the  race 
may  be  unable  to  drive  a  nail  straight,  while  the  man 
who  can  build  the  most  intricate  mechanism  out  of 
crude  iron,  wood  and  metal  may  be  unable  to  express 
any  but  the  commonplaces  of  existence.  Intelligence, 
acting  through  skill,  has  evolved  machinery  and  the  in- 
dustrial evolution;  acting  to  discover  constant  prin- 
ciples operating  in  experience,  it  has  established  science. 
Seeking  to  explain  and  control  the  world  of  unknown 
forces,  it  has  evolved  theory  and  practice.  A  very  essen- 
tial division  of  people  is  on  the  one  hand  those  whose 
effort  is  to  explain  things,  and  who  are  called  theorists, 
and  those  who  seek  to  control  things,  the  practical 
persons.  There  is  a  constant  duel  between  these  two 
types  of  personalities,  and  since  the  practical  usually 
control  the  power  of  the  world,  the  theorists  and  ex- 
plainers have  had  rather  a  hard  time  of  it,  though  they 
are  slowly  coming  into  their  own. 

Another  difference  between  minds  is  this:  that  in- 
telligence deals  with  the  relations  between  things  (this 


INTELLIGENCE  AND  WILL  115 

being  a  prime  function  of  speech),  and  intelligence  only 
becomes  intellect  when  it  is  able  to  see  the  world  from 
the  standpoint  of  abstract  ideas,  such  as  truth,  beauty, 
love,  honor,  goodness,  evil,  justice,  race,  individual,  etc. 
The  wider  one  can  generalize  correctly,  the  higher  the 
intellect.  The  practical  man  rarely  seeks  wide  gen- 
eralizations because  the  truth  of  these  and  their  value 
can  only  be  demonstrated  through  the  course  of  long 
periods  of  time,  during  which  no  good  to  the  individual 
himself  is  seen.  Besides  which,  the  practical  man 
knows  that  the  wide  generalization  may  be  an  error. 
Practical  aims  are  usually  immediate  aims,  whereas  the 
aims  of  intellect  are  essentially  remote  and  may  project 
beyond  the  life  of  the  thinker  himself. 

We  speak  of  people  as  original  or  as  the  reverse,  with 
the  understanding  that  originality  is  the  basis  of  the 
world's  progress.  To  be  original  in  thought  is  to  add 
new  relationships  to  those  already  accepted,  or  to  sub- 
stitute new  ones  for  the  old.  The  original  person  is 
not  easily  credulous;  he  applies  to  traditional  teaching 
and  procedure  the  acid  test  of  results.  Thus  the  astron- 
omers who  rejected  the  theological  idea  that  the  earth 
was  the  center  of  the  universe  observed  that  eclipses 
could  not  be  explained  on  such  a  basis,  and  Harvey,  as 
he  dissected  bullocks'  hearts  and  tied  tourniquets  around 
his  arms,  could  not  believe  that  Galen's  teaching  on 
circulation  fitted  what  he  saw  of  the  veins  and  valves 
of  his  arm.  The  original  observer  refuses  to  slide  over 
stubborn  facts;  authority  has  less  influence  with  him 
than  has  an  apple  dropping  downward.  In  another  way 
the  original  thinker  is  constantly  taking  apart  his  ex- 
periences and  readjusting  the  pieces  into  new  combina- 
tions of  beauty,  usefulness  and  truth.  This  he  does  as 
artist,  inventor  and  scientist.     Most  originality  lies  in 


116  THE  FOUNDATIONS  OF  PERSONALITY 

the  rejection  of  old  ideas  and  methods  as  not  consonant 
with  results  and  experience;  in  the  taking  apart  and 
the  isolation  of  the  components  of  experience  (analy- 
sis) and  in  their  reassemblage  into  new  combinations 
(synthesis).  The  organizing  activity  of  the  original 
mind  is  high,  and  curiosity  and  interest  are  usually 
well  maintained.  Unless  there  is  with  these  traits  the 
quality  called  good  judgment  (i.e.,  good  choice),  the 
original  is  merely  one  of  those  "  pests  "  who  launch 
half-baked  reforms  and  projects  upon  a  weary  world. 
We  have  spoken  of  intelligence  as  controlling  and 
directing  instinct  and  desire,  as  inhibiting  emotion,  as 
exhibiting  itself  in  handicraftsmanship,  as  the  builder 
up  of  abstractions  and  the  principles  of  power  and 
knowledge;  we  have  omitted  its  relationship  to  speech. 
Without  speech  and  its  derivatives,  man  would  still  be 
a  naked  savage  and  not  so  well  off  in  his  struggle  for 
existence  as  most  of  the  larger  animals.  It  is  possible 
that  we  can  think  without  words,  but  surely  very  little 
thinking  is  possible  under  such  circumstances.  One 
might  conduct  a  business  without  definite  records,  but 
it  would  be  a  very  small  one.  Speech  is  a  means  not 
only  of  designating  things  but  of  the  manifest  relations 
between  things.  It  "short-cuts"  thought  so  that  we 
may  store  up  a  thousand  experiences  in  one  word.  But 
its  stupendous  value  and  effects  lie  in  this,  that  in 
words  not  only  do  we  store  up  ourselves  (could  we  be 
self-conscious  without  words?)  and  things,  but  we  are 
able  to  interchange  ourselves  and  our  things  with  any 
one  else  in  the  world  who  understands  our  speech  and 
writings.  And  we  may  truly  converse  with  the  dead 
and  be  profoundly  changed  by  them.  If  the  germ 
plasm  is  the  organ  of  biological  heredity,  speech  and 
its -derivatives  are  the  organs  of  social  heredity! 


INTELLIGENCE  AND  WILL  117 

The  power  of  expressing  thought  in  words,  of  com- 
pressing experiences  into  spoken  and  written  symbols, 
of  being  eloquent  or  convincing  either  by  tongue  or  pen, 
is  thus  a  high  function  of  intelligence.  The  able  speaker 
and  writer  has  always  been  powerful,  and  he  has  al- 
ways found  a  high  social  value  in  promulgating  the 
ideas  of  those  too  busy  or  unfitted  for  this  task,  and 
he  has  been  the  chief  agent  in  the  unification  of  groups. 

The  danger  that  lies  in  words  as  the  symbols  of 
thought  lies  in  the  fact  pointed  out  by  Francis  Bacon  ^ 
(and  in  our  day  by  Wundt  and  Jung)  that  words  have 
been  coined  by  the  mass  of  people  and  have  come  to 
mean  very  definitely  the  relations  between  things  aa 
conceived  by  the  ignorant  majority,  so  that  when  the 
philosopher  or  scientist  seeks  to  use  them,  he  finds  him- 
self hampered  by  the  false  beliefs  inherent  in  the  word 
and  by  the  lack  of  precision  in  the  current  use  of  words. 
Moreover,  words  are  also  a  means  of  stirring  up  emo- 
tions, hate,  love,  passion,  and  become  weapons  in  a 
struggle  for  power  and  therefore  obscure  intelligence. 

Words,  themselves,  arise  in  our  social  relations,  for 
the  solitary  human  would  never  speak,  and  the  thought 
we  think  of  as  peculiarly  our  own  is  intensely  social. 
Indeed,  as  Cooley  pointed  out,  our  thought  is  usually 
in  a  dialogue  form  with  an  auditor  who  listens  and 
whose  applause  we  desire  and  whose  arguments  we 
meet.  In  children,  who  think  aloud,  this  trend  is  ob- 
vious, for  they  say,  "you,  I,  no,  yes,  I  mustn't,  you 
mustn't,"  and  terms  of  dialogue  and  social  intercourse 
appear  constantly.  Thought  and  words  offer  us  the 
basis  of  definite  internal  conflict:  one  part  of  us  says 
to  the  other,  "  You  must  not  do  that,"  and  the  other 
answers,  "  What  shall  I  do?  "     Desire  may  run  along 

*  This  is  Bacon's  "  Idols  of  the  Market  Place." 


118  THE  FOUNDATIONS  OF  PERSONALITY 

smoothly  without  distinct,  internal  vert)al  thought  until 
it  runs  into  inhibition  which  becomes  at  once  distinctly 
verbal  in  its,  "  No !  You  musn't !  "  But  desire  ob- 
structed also  becomes  verbal  and  we  hear  within  us, 
"I  will!" 

We  live  secure  in  the  belief  that  our  thoughts  are 
our  own  and  cannot  be  "  read  "  by  others.  Yet  in  our 
intercourse  we  seek  to  read  the  thoughts  of  others  — 
the  real  thoughts  —  recognizing  that  just  as  we  do  not 
express  ourselves  either  accurately  or  honestly,  so  may 
the  other  be  limited  or  disingenuous.  Whenever  there 
occurs  a  feeling  of  inferiority,  the  face  is  averted  so  the 
thoughts  may  not  be  read,  and  it  is  very  common  for 
people  mentally  diseased  to  believe  that  their  thoughts 
are  being  read  and  published.  Indeed,  the  connection 
between  thoughts  and  the  personality  may  be  severed 
and  the  patient  mistakes  as  an  outside  voice  his  own 
thoughts. 

A  large  part  of  ancient  and  modern  belief  and  super- 
stition hinges  on  the  feeling  of  power  in  thought  and 
therefore  in  words.  Thought  causes  things  as  any  other 
power  does.  Think  something  hard,  use  the  appropri- 
ate word,  and  presto, —  what  you  desire  is  done.  "  Faith 
moves  mountains,"  and  the  kindred  beliefs  of  the  magic 
in  words  have  plunged  the  world  into  abysses  of  super- 
stition. Thought  is  powerful,  words  are  powerful,  if 
combined  with  the  appropriate  action,  and  in  their  in- 
direct effects.  All  our  trimphs  are  thought  and  word 
products ;  so,  too,  are  our  defeats. 

It  is  not  profitable  for  us  at  this  stage  to  study  the 
types  of  intelligence  in  greater  detail.  In  the  larger 
aspects  of  intelligence  we  must  regard  it  as  intimately 
blended  with  emotions,  mood,  instincts,  and  in  its  con- 
trol of  them  is  a  measurement  of  character.     We  may 


INTELLIGENCE  AND  WILL  119 

ask  what  is  the  range  of  memory,  what  is  the  capacity 
for  choosing,  how  good  is  the  planning  ability,  how 
active  is  the  organizing  ability,  what  is  the  type  of 
associations  that  predominate  and  how  active  is  the 
stream  of  thought?  What  is  the  skill  of  the  individual? 
How  well  does  he  use  words  and  to  what  end  does  he 
use  them?  Intelligence  deals  with  the  variables  of 
life,  leaving  to  instinct  the  basic  reactions,  but  it  is 
in  these  variables  that  intelligence  meets  situations 
that  of  themselves  would  end  disastrously  for  the  in- 
dividual. 

Not  a  line,  so  far,  on  Will.  What  of  the  will,  basic 
force  in  character  and  center  of  a  controversy  that  will 
never  end?  Has  man  a  free  will?  does  his  choice  of 
action  and  thought  come  from  a  power  within  himself? 
Is  there  a  uniting  will,  operating  in  our  actions,  a 
something  of  an  integral  indivisible  kind,  which  is  non- 
material  yet  which  controls  matter? 

Taking  the  free-will  idea  at  its  face  value  leads  us 
nowhere  in  our  study  of  character.  If  character  in  its 
totality  is  organic,  so  is  will,  and  it  therefore  resides  in 
the  tissues  of  our  organism  and  is  subject  to  its  laws. 
In  some  mental  diseases  the  central  disturbance  is  in 
the  will,  as  Kraepelin  postulates  in  the  disease  known 
as  Dementia  Praecox.  The  power  of  choice  and  the 
power  of  acting  according  to  choice  disappear  gradually, 
leaving  the  individual  inert  and  apathetic.  The  will 
may  alter  its  directions  in  disease  (or  rather  be  altered) 
so  that  because  of  a  tumor  mass  in  the  brain,  or  a  clot 
of  blood,  or  the  extirpation  of  his  testicles,  he  chooses 
and  acts  on  different  principles  than  ever  before  in  his 
life.  Or  you  get  a  man  drunk,  introduce  into  his  or- 
ganism the  soluble  narcotic  alcohol,  and  you  change  his 
will  in  the  sense  that  he  chooses  to  be  foolish  or  im- 


120  THE  FOUNDATIONS  OF  PERSONALITY 

moral  or  brutal,  and  acts  accordingly.  When  from 
Philip  drunk  we  appeal  to  Philip  sober,  we  acknowledge 
that  the  two  Philips  are  different  and  will  different 
things.  And  the  will  of  the  child  is  not  the  will  of  the 
adult,  nor  is  that  the  will  of  the  old  man.  If  will  is 
organic  it  cannot  be  free,  but  is  conditioned  by  health, 
glandular  activity,  tissue  chemistry,  age,  social  set- 
ting, education,  intelligence. 

Moreover,  behind  each  choice  and  each  act  are  mo- 
tives set  up  by  the  whole  past  of  the  individual,  set  up 
by  heredity  and  training,  by  the  will  of  our  ancestors 
and  our  contemporaries.  Logically  and  psychologi- 
cally, we  cannot  agree  that  a  free  agent  has  any  con- 
ditions; and  if  it  has  any  conditions,  it  cannot  in  any 
phase  be  free.  To  set  up  an  argument  for  free  will 
one  has  to  appeal  to  the  consciousness  or  have  a  deep 
religious  motive.  But  even  the  ecclesiastical  psycholO' 
gistft  and  even  so  strong  a  believer  in  free  will  as  Mun- 
sterberg  take  the  stand  that  we  may  have  two  points 
of  view,  one  —  as  religiously  minded  —  that  there  is  a 
free  will,  and  the  other  —  as  scientists  —  that  will  is 
determined  in  its  operations  by  causes  that  reach  back 
in  an  endless  chain.  The  power  to  choose  and  the 
power  to  act  may  be  heightened  by  advice  and  admoni- 
tions. In  this  sense  we  may  properly  tell  a  man  to  use 
his  will,  and  we  may  seek  to  introduce  into  him  motives 
that  will  fortify  his  resolution,  remove  or  increase  his 
inhibitions,  make  clearer  his  choice.  But  that  will  is 
an  entity,  existing  by  itself  and  pulling  at  levers  of 
conduct  without  itself  being  organic,  need  not  be  enter- 
tained by  any  serious-minded  student  of  his  kind. 

Is  there  a  unit,  will?  A  will  power?  I  can  see  no 
good  evidence  for  this  belief  except  the  generalizing 
trend  of  human  thought  and  the  fallacy  that  raises 


INTELLIGENCE  AND  WILL  121 

abstractions  into  realities.  Napoleon  had  a  strong  will 
in  regard  to  his  battles  and  a  weak  one  regarding 
women.  Pitt  was  a  determined  statesman  but  could 
not  resist  the  lure  of  drink.  Socrates  found  no  diffi- 
culty in  dying  for  his  beliefs,  but  asked  not  to  be  tempted 
by  a  beautiful  youth.  Francis  Bacon  took  all  knowl- 
edge to  be  his  province,  and  his  will  was  equal  to  the 
task,  but  he  found  the  desire  for  riches  too  great  for 
him.  In  reality,  man  is  a  mosaic  of  wills;  and  the  will 
of  each  instinct,  each  desire,  each  purpose,  is  the  in- 
tensity of  that  instinct,  desire  or  purpose.  In  each  of 
us  there  is  a  clash  of  wills,  as  the  trends  in  our  char- 
acter oppose  one  another.  The  united  self  harmonizes 
its  purposes  and  wills  into  as  nearly  one  as  possible; 
the  disunited  self  is  standing  unsteadily  astride  two 
or  more  horses.  We  all  know  that  it  is  easy  for  us  to 
accomplish  certain  things  and  difficult  to  make  up 
our  minds  to  do  others.  Like  and  dislike,  facility  or 
difficulty  are  part  of  each  purpose  and  enter  into  each 
will  as  parts. 

Such  a  view  does  not  commit  one  to  fatalism,  at  least 
in  conduct.  Desiring  to  accomplish  something  or  de- 
siring to  avoid  doing  something,  both  of  which  are 
usually  considered  as  part  of  willing,  we  must  seek  to 
find  motives  and  influences  that  will  help  us.  We  must 
realize  that  each  choice,  each  act,  changes  the  world 
for  us  and  every  one  else  and  seek  to  harmonize  our 
choice  and  acts  with  the  purposes  we  regard  as  our 
best.  If  we  seek  to  influence  others,  then  this  view 
of  the  will  is  the  only  hopeful  one,  for  if  will  is  a  free 
entity  how  can  it  possibly  be  influenced  by  another 
agent?  The  very  essence  of  freedom  is  to  be  non-in- 
fluenced. Seeking  to  galvanize  the  will  of  another,  there 


122  THE  FOUNDATIONS  OF  PERSONALITY 

is  need  to  search  for  the  influences  that  will  increase 
the  energy  of  his  better  purposes,  to  "  appeal  to  his 
better  self,"  meaning  that  the  spurs  to  his  good  con- 
duct are  applied  with  greater  force,  but  that  first  the 
nature  of  the  particular  things  that  spur  him  on  must 
be  discovered.  Praise?  Blame?  Reward?  Punish- 
ment? Education?  Authority?  Logic?  Religion? 
Emotional  appeal?  Substitution  of  new  motives  and 
associations? 

The  will  is  therefore  no  unit,  but  a  sum  total  of  things 
operating  within  the  sphere  of  purpose.  Purpose  we 
have  defined  as  arising  from  instinct  and  desire  and  in- 
tellectualized  and  socialized  by  intelligence,  education, 
training,  tradition,  etc.  Will  is  therefore  best  studied 
under  the  head  of  purpose  and  is  an  outgrowth  of  in- 
stinct. Each  instinct,  in  its  energy,  its  fierceness,  its 
permanence,  has  its  will.  He  who  cannot  desire  deeply, 
in  whom  some  powerful  instinct  does  not  surge,  cannot 
will  deeply. 

If  we  look  at  character  from  the  standpoint  of  emo- 
tion, instinct,  purpose  and  intelligence,  we  find  that 
emotion  is  an  internal  discharge  of  energy,  which  being 
felt  by  the  individual  becomes  an  aim  or  aversion  of 
his  life;  that  instinctive  action  is  the  passing  over  of 
a  stimulus  directly  into  hereditary  conduct  along  race- 
old  motor  pathways  for  purposes  that  often  enough  the 
individual  does  not  recognize  and  may  even  rebel 
against;  that  instinct  is  without  reflection,  but  that 
purpose,  which  is  an  outgrowth  of  instinct  guided  and 
controlled  by  intelligence,  is  reflective  and  self-conscious. 
Purpose  seeks  the  good  of  the  individual  as  understood 
by  him  and  is  often  against  the  welfare  of  the  race, 
whereas  instinct  seeks  the  good  of  the  race,  often  against 


INTELLIGENCE  AND  WILL  123 

the  welfare  of  the  individuaL  Intelligence  i8  the  path 
of  the  stimulus  or  need  cerebrally  directed,  lengthened 
out,  inhibited,  elaborated  and  checked.  Often  enough 
faulty,  it  is  the  chief  instrument  by  which  man  has  be- 
come the  leading  figure  on  the  world  stage. 


CHAPTER  VII 

EXCITEMENT,    MONOTONY  AND  INTEREST 

No  matter  what  happens  in  the  outside  world,  be  it 
something  we  see,  hear  or  feel,  in  any  sense-field  there 
is  an  internal  reverberation  in  onr  bodies, —  excitement. 
Excitement  is  the  undifferentiated  result  of  stimuli, 
whether  these  come  from  without  or  from  within.  For 
a  change  in  the  glands  of  the  body  heaps  up  changes 
within  us,  which  when  felt,  become  excitement.  Thus 
at  the  mating  period  of  animals,  at  the  puberty  of  man, 
there  is  a  quite  evident  excitement  demonstrated  in  the 
conduct  of  the  animal  and  the  adolescent.  He  who 
remembers  his  own  adolescence,  or  who  watches  the 
boy  or  girl  of  that  age,  sees  the  excitement  in  the  readi- 
ness to  laugh,  cry,  fight  or  love  that  is  so  striking. 

Undoubtedly  the  mother-stuff  of  all  emotion  is  the 
feeling  of  excitement.  Before  any  emotion  reaches  its 
characteristic  expression  there  is  the  preparatory  ten- 
sion of  excitement.  Joy,  sorrow,  anger,  fear,  wonder, 
surprise,  etc.,  have  in  them  as  a  basis  the  same  conscious- 
ness of  an  internal  activity,  of  a  world  within  us  begin- 
ning to  seethe.  Heart,  lungs,  blood  stream,  the  great 
viscera  and  the  internal  glands,  cerebrum  and  sympa- 
thetic nervous  system,  all  participate  in  this  activity, 
and  the  outward  visage  of  excitement  is  always  the 
wide-open  eye,  the  slightly  parted  lips,  the  flaring  nos- 
trils and  the  slightly  tensed  muscles  of  the  whole  body. 
Shouts,  cries,  the  waving  of  arms  and  legs,  taking  the 
specific  direction  of  some  emotion,  make  of  excitement 


EXCITEMENT,  MONOTONY  AND  INTEREST  125 

a  fierce  discharger  of  energy,  a  fact  of  great  importance 
in  the  understanding  of  social  and  pathological  phenom- 
ena. On  the  other  hand,  excitement  may  be  so  intensely 
internal  that  it  shifts  the  blood  supply  too  vigorously 
from  the  head  and  the  result  is  a  swoon.  This  is  more 
especially  true  of  the  excitement  that  accompanies  sor- 
row and  fear  than  joy  or  anger,  but  even  in  these  emo- 
tions it  occurs. 

There  are  some  very  important  phases  of  excitement 
that  have  not  been  given  suflBcient  weight  in  most  of 
the  discussions. 

1.  In  the  very  young,  excitement  is  diffuse  and  spreads 
throughout  the  organism.  An  infant  starts  with  a 
jump  at  a  sudden  sound  and  shivers  at  a  bright  light. 
A  young  child  is  unrestrained  and  general  in  his  ex- 
pression of  excitement,  no  matter  what  emotional  direc- 
tion that  excitement  takes.  Bring  about  any  tension 
of  expectation  in  a  child  —  have  him  wait  for  your  head 
to  appear  around  the  corner  as  you  play  peek-a-boo,  or 
delay  opening  the  box  of  candy,  or  pretend  you  are  one 
thing  or  another  —  and  the  excitement  of  the  child  is 
manifested  in  what  is  known  as  eagerness.  Attention 
in  children  is  accompanied  by  excitement  and  is  weary- 
ing as  a  natural  result,  since  excitement  means  a  physi- 
cal discharge  of  energy.  A  child  laughs  all  over  and 
weeps  with  his  entire  body;  his  anger  involves  every 
muscle  of  his  body  and  his  fear  is  an  explosion.  The 
young  organism  cannot  inhibit  excitement. 

As  life  goes  on,  the  capacity  for  localizing  or  limiting 
excitement  increases.  We  become  better  organized,  and 
the  disrupting  force  of  a  stimulus  becomes  less.  Atten- 
tion becomes  less  painful,  less  tense,  i.e.,  there  is  less 
general  muscular  and  emotional  reaction.  Expectation 
is  less  a  physical  matter  —  perhaps  because  we  have 


126  THE  FOUNDATIONS  OF  PERSONALITY 

been  so  often  disappointed  —  and  is  more  cerebral  and 
the  emotions  are  more  reflective  and  introspective  in 
their  expression  and  less  a  physical  outburst.  Indeed, 
the  process  often  enough  goes  too  far,  and  we  long  for 
the  excitement  of  anticipation  and  realization.  We  do 
not  start  at  a  noise,  and  though  a  great  crowd  will  "  stir 
our  blood  "  (excitement  popularly  phrased  and  accu- 
rately), we  still  limit  that  excitement  so  that  though  we 
cheer  or  shout  there  is  a  core  of  us  that  is  quiet. 

This  is  the  case  in  health.  In  sickness,  especially  in 
that  condition  known  as  neurasthenia,  where  the  main 
symptoms  cluster  around  an  abnormal  liability  to  fa- 
tigue, and  also  in  many  other  conditions,  there  is  an 
increase  in  the  diffusion  of  excitement  so  that  one  starts 
all  over  at  a  noise,  instead  of  merely  turning  to  see  what 
it  is,  so  that  expectation  and  attention  become  painful 
and  fatiguing.  Crowds,  though  usually  pleasurable, 
become  too  exciting,  and  there  is  a  sort  of  confusion 
resulting  because  attention  and  comprehension  are  in- 
terfered with.  The  neurasthenic  finds  himself  a  prey 
to  stimuli,  his  reaction  is  too  great  and  he  fatigues  too 
readily.  He  finds  sleep  difficult  because  the  little  noises 
and  discomforts  make  difficult  the  relaxation  that  is  so 
important.  The  neurasthenic's  voluntary  attention  is 
lowered  because  of  the  excitement  he  feels  when  his 
involuntary  attention  is  aroused. 

In  the  condition  called  anhedonia,  which  we  shall 
hear  of  from  time  to  time,  there  is  a  blocking  or  drop- 
ping out  of  the  sense  of  desire  and  satisfaction  even 
if  through  habit  one  eats,  drinks,  has  sexual  relation- 
ship, keeps  up  his  work  and  carries  out  his  plans.  This 
lack  of  desire  for  the  joys  of  life  is  attended  by  a  rest- 
lessness, a  seeking  of  excitement  for  a  time,  until  there 
arises  a  curious  over-reaction  to  excitement.     The  an- 


EXCITEMENT,  MONOTONY  AND  INTEREST  127 

hedonic  patient  finds  that  noises  are  very  troublesome, 
that  he  becomes  unpleasantly  excited  over  music,  that 
company  is  distressing  because  he  becomes  confused  and 
excited,  and  crowds,  busy  scenes  and  streets  are  intol- 
erable. Many  a  hermit,  I  fancy,  who  found  the  sensual 
and  ambitious  pleasure  of  life  intolerable,  who  sought 
to  fly  from  crowds  to  the  deserts,  was  anhedonic  but 
he  called  it  renunciation.  (Whether  one  really  ever 
renounces  when  desire  is  still  strong  is  a  nice  question. 
I  confess  to  some  scepticism  on  this  point.) 

2.  Seeking  excitement  is  one  of  the  great  pleasure- 
trends  of  life.  In  moderation,  tension,  expectation  and 
the  diffuse  bodily  reactions  are  agreeable;  there  is  a 
feeling  of  vigor,  the  attention  is  drawn  from  the  self 
and  there  is  a  feeling  of  being  alive  that  is  pleasurable. 
The  tension  must  not  be  too  long  sustained,  nor  the 
bodily  reaction  too  intense ;  relaxation  and  lowered  at- 
tention must  relieve  the  excitement  from  time  to  time; 
but  with  these  kept  in  mind,  it  is  true  that  Man  is  a 
seeker  of  excitement. 

This  is  a  factor  neglected  in  the  study  of  great  social 
phenomena.  The  growth  of  cities  is  not  only  a  result  of 
the  economic  forces  of  the  time;  it  is  made  permanent 
by  the  fact  that  the  cities  are  exciting.  The  multiplic- 
ity and  variety  of  the  stimuli  of  a  city  —  social,  sexual, 
its  stir  and  bustle  —  make  it  difficult  for  those  once 
habituated  ever  to  tolerate  the  quiet  of  the  country.  Ex- 
citement follows  the  great  law  of  stimulation ;  the  same 
internal  effect,  the  same  feeling,  requires  a  greater  and 
greater  stimulus,  as  well  as  new  stimuli.  So,  the  cities 
grow  larger,  increase  their  modes  of  excitement,  and 
the  dweller  in  the  city,  unless  fortified  by  a  steady  pur- 
pose, becomes  a  seeker  of  excitement. 

Not  only  is  excitement  pleasurable   when  reached 


128  THE  FOUNDATIONS  OF  PERSONALITY 

through  the  intrinsically  agreeable  but  it  can  be  ob- 
tained from  small  doses  of  the  intrinsically  disagreeable. 
This  is  the  explanation  of  the  pleasure  obtained  from 
the  gruesome,  from  the  risk  of  life  or  limb,  or  from 
watching  others  risk  life  or  limb.  Aside  from  the  sense 
of  power  obtained  by  traveling  fast,  it  is  the  risk,  the 
slight  fear,  producing  excitement,  that  makes  the  speed 
maniac  a  menace  to  the  highways.  And  I  think  that 
part  of  the  pleasure  obtained  from  bitter  foods  is  that 
the  disagreeable  element  is  just  sufficient  to  excite  the 
gastro-intestinal  tract.  The  fascination  of  the  horrible 
lies  in  the  excitement  produced,  an  excitement  that  turns 
to  horror  and  disgust  if  the  disagreeable  is  presented 
too  closely.  Thus  we  can  read  with  pleasurable  excite- 
ment of  things  that  in  their  reality  would  shock  us  into 
profoundest  pain.  The  more  jaded  one  is,  the  more  used 
to  excitement,  the  more  he  seeks  what  are,  ordinarily, 
disagreeable  methods  of  excitement.  Thus  pain  in 
slight  degree  is  exciting,  and  in  the  sexual  sphere  pain 
is  often  sought  as  a  means  of  heightening  the  pleasure, 
especially  by  women  and  by  the  roue.  I  suspect  also 
that  the  haircloth  shirt  and  the  sackcloth  and  ashes 
of  the  anhedonic  hermit  were  painful  methods  of  seek- 
ing excitement. 

Sometimes  pain  is  used  in  small  amounts  to  relieve 
excitement.  Thus  the  man  who  bites  his  finger  nails 
to  the  quick  gets  a  degree  of  satisfaction  from  the  habit. 
Indeed,  all  manner  of  habitual  and  absurd  movements, 
from  scratching  to  pacing  up  and  down,  are  efforts  to 
relieve  the  tension  of  excitement.  One  of  my  patients 
under  any  excitement  likes  to  put  his  hands  in  very 
hot  water,  and  the  pain,  by  its  localization,  takes  away 
from  the  diffuse  and  unpleasant  excitement.  The  dif- 
fuse uncontrolled  excitement  of  itching  is  often  relieved 


EXCITEMENT,  MONOTONY  AND  INTEREST  129 

by  painful  biting  and  scratching.  Here  is  an  effort  to 
localize  a  feeling  and  thus  avoid  diffuse  discomfort,  — 
a  sort  of  homeopathic  treatment. 

3.  As  a  corollary  to  the  need  of  excitement  and  its 
pleasure  is  the  reaction  to  monotony.  Monotony  is  one 
of  the  most  dreaded  factors  in  the  life  of  man.  The  in- 
ternal resources  of  most  of  us  are  but  small;  we  can 
furnish  excitement  and  interest  from  our  own  store  for 
but  a  short  time,  and  there  then  ensues  an  intense  yearn- 
ing for  something  or  somebody  that  will  take  up  our 
attention  and  give  a  direction  to  our  thought  and  action. 
Under  monotony  the  thought  turns  inward,  there  is 
daydreaming  and  introspection,^  which  are  pleasurable 
only  at  certain  times  for  most  of  us  and  which  grow 
less  pleasurable  as  we  grow  older.  Watch  the  faces  of 
people  thinking  as  they  travel  alone  in  cars,  —  and 
rarely  does  one  see  a  happy  face.  The  lines  of  the  face 
droop  and  sighs  are  frequent.  Monotony  and  melan- 
choly are  not  far  apart ;  monotony  and  a  restless  seeking 
for  excitement  are  almost  synonymous.  Of  course,  what 
constitutes  monotony  will  differ  in  the  viewpoint  of 
each  person,  for  some  are  so  constituted  and  habituated 
(for  habit  is  a  great  factor)  that  it  takes  but  few  stimuli 
to  arouse  a  well-sustained  interest,  and  others  need  or 
think  they  need  many  things,  a  constantly  changing  set 
of  circumstances  for  pleasure. 

Restlessness,  eager  searching  for  change,  intense  dis- 
satisfaction are  the  natural  fruit  of  monotony.  Here 
is  an  important  item  in  the  problems  of  ouf  times.  Side 
by  side  with  growth  of  the  cities  and  their  excitement 
is  the  growing  monotony  of  most  labor.  The  factory, 
with  its  specialized  production,  reduces  the  worker  to 

*  Stanley  Hall,  in  his  book  "  Adolescence,"  lays  great  stress  on  mo- 
notony and  its  effects.     See  also  Graham  Wallas'  "  The  Great  Society." 


130  THE  FOUNDATIONS  OF  PERSONALITY 

a  cog  in  the  machinery.  In  some  factories,  in  the  name 
of  eflftciency,  the  windows  are  whitewashed  so  that  the 
outside  world  is  shut  out  and  talking  is  prohibited ;  the 
worker  passes  his  day  performing  his  unvaried  task 
from  morning  to  night.  Under  such  circumstances 
there  arises  either  a  burning  sense  of  wrong,  of  injustice, 
of  slavery  and  a  thwarting  of  the  individual  dignity, 
or  else  a  yearning  for  the  end  of  the  day,  for  dancing, 
drinking,  gambling,  for  anything  that  offers  excitement. 
Or  perhaps  both  reactions  are  combined.  Our  indus- 
trial world  is  poorly  organized  economically,  as  witness 
the  poor  distribution  of  wealth  and  the  periodic  crises, 
but  it  is  abominably  organized  from  the  standpoint  of 
the  happiness  of  the  worker.  Of  this,  more  in  another 
place. 

Monotony  brings  fatigue,  because  there  is  a  shutting 
out  of  the  excitement  that  acts  as  an  antidote  to  fatigue- 
feeling.  A  man  who  works  without  fatigue  six  days 
a  week  is  tired  all  day  Sunday  and  longs  for  Monday. 
The  modern  housewife,^  with  her  four  walls  and  the 
unending,  uninteresting  tasks,  is  worn  out,  and  her  fa- 
tigue reaction  is  the  greater  the  more  her  previous  life 
has  been  exciting  and  varied.  Fatigue  often  enough  is 
present  not  because  of  the  work  done  but  because  the 
stimulus  to  work  has  disappeared.  Monotony  is  an 
enemy  of  character.  Variety,  in  its  normal  aspect,  is 
not  only  the  spice  of  life ;  it  is  a  great  need.  Stabiliza- 
tion of  purpose  and  work  are  necessary,  but  a  standard- 
ization that  stamps  out  the  excitement  of  variety  is  a 
deadly  blow  to  human  happiness. 

Under  monotony  certain  types  of  personalities  de- 
velop an  intense  inner  life,  which  may  be  pathological, 
or  it  may  be  exceedingly  fruitful  of  productive  thought. 

*  See  my  book  "  The  Nervous  Housewife." 


EXCITEMENT,  MONOTONY  AND  INTEREST  131 

Some  build  up  a  delusional  thought  and  feeling.  For 
delusion  merely  means  uncorrected  thought  and  belief, 
and  we  can  only  correct  by  contact  and  collision.  The 
whole  outer  world  may  vanish  or  become  hostile  and 
true  mental  disease  develop.  Perhaps  it  is  more  nearly 
correct  to  say  that  minds  predisposed  to  mental  disease 
find  in  monotony  a  circumstance  favoring  disease. 

On  the  other  hand,  a  vigorous  mind  shut  out  from 
outer  stimuli  ^  finds  in  this  circumstance  the  time  to  de- 
velop leisurely,  finds  a  freedom  from  distraction  that 
leads  to  clear  views  of  life  and  a  proper  expression.  A 
periodic  retirement  from  the  busy,  too-busy  world  is 
necessary  for  the  thinker  that  he  may  digest  his  mate- 
rial, that  he  may  strip  away  unessential  beliefs,  that  he 
may  find  what  it  is  he  really  needs,  strives  for  and  ought 
to  have. 

4.  Here  we  come  to  another  corollary  of  the  need  for 
excitement,  the  need  of  relaxation.  At  any  rate, 
satisfaction  and  pleasure  need  periods  of  hunger  in 
order  to  be  felt.  In  the  story  of  Buddha  he  is  repre- 
sented as  being  shielded  from  all  sorrow  and  pain,  living 
a  life  filled  with  pleasure  and  excitement,  yet  he  sought 
out  pain.  So  excitement,  if  too  long  continued  —  or 
rather  if  a  situation  that  produces  excitement  of  a  pleas- 
urable kind  be  too  long  endured  —  will  result  in  bore- 
dom. "  Things  get  to  be  the  same,"  whether  it  be  the 
excitement  of  love,  the  city,  sports  or  what  not.  This 
is  a  basic  law  of  all  pleasures.  In  order  that  life  may 
have  zest,  that  excitement  may  be  easily  and  pleasur- 
ably  evoked  and  by  normal  means,  we  need  relaxation, 
periods  free  from  excitement,  or  we  must  pass  on  to 

^Perhaps  this  is  why  real  genius  does  not  flourish  in  our  crowded, 
over-busy  days,  despite  the  great  amount  of  talent. 


132  THE  FOUNDATIONS  OF  PERSONALITY 

a  costly  chase  for  excitement  that  brings  breakdown  of 
the  character. 

5.  If  the  seeking  of  excitement,  as  such,  is  one  of  the 
prime  pleasures  of  life,  organized  excitement  in  the 
form  of  interest  is  the  directing  and  guiding  principle 
of  activity.  At  the  outset  of  life  interest  is  in  the  main 
involuntary  and  is  aroused  by  the  sights,  sounds  and 
happenings  of  the  outer  world.  As  time  goes  on,  as  the 
organism  develops,  as  memories  of  past  experiences  be- 
come active,  as  peculiarities  of  personality  develop,  and 
as  instincts  reach  activity,  interest  commences  to  take 
definite  direction,  to  become  canalized,  so  to  speak.  In 
fact,  the  development  of  interest  is  from  the  diffuse  in- 
voluntary form  of  early  childhood  to  a  specialization,  a 
condensation  into  definite  voluntary  channels.  This 
development  goes  on  unevenly,  and  is  a  very  variable 
feature  in  the  lives  of  all  of  us.  Great  ability  expresses 
itself  in  a  sustained  interest ;  a  narrow  character  is  one 
with  overdeformed,  too  narrow  interest;  failure  is  often 
the  retention  of  the  childish  character  of  diffuse,  invol- 
untary interest.  And  the  capacity  to  sustain  interest 
depends  not  only  on  the  special  strength  of  the  various 
abilities  of  the  individual,  but  remarkably  on  his  energy 
and  health.  Sustained  "  voluntary "  interest  is  far 
more  fatiguing  than  involuntary  interest,  and  where 
fatigue  is  already  present  it  becomes  difficult  and  per- 
haps impossible.  Thus  after  much  work,  whether  phys- 
ical or  mental,  during  and  after  illness  —  especially  in 
influenza,  in  neurasthenic  states  generally,  or  where 
there  is  an  inner  conflict  —  interest  in  its  adult  form 
is  at  a  low  ebb. 

There  are  two  main  directions  which  interest  may 
take,  because  there  are  two  worlds  in  which  we  live. 
There  is  the  inner  world  of  our  feelings,  our  thoughts, 


EXCITEMENT,  MONOTONY  AND  INTEREST  133 

onr  desires  and  our  struggles,*  —  and  there  is  the  outer 
world,  with  its  people,  its  things,  its  hostilities,  its 
friendships,  its  problems  and  facts,  its  attractions  and 
repulsions.  Man  divides  his  interest  between  the  two 
worlds,  for  in  both  of  them  are  the  values. of  existence. 
The  chief  source  of  voluntary  interest  lies  in  desire  and 
value,  and  though  these  are  frequently  in  coalescence,  so 
that  the  thing  we  desire  is  the  thing  we  value,  more 
often  they  are  not  in  coalescence  and  then  we  have  the 
divided  self  that  James  so  eloquently  describes.  So 
there  are  types  of  men  to  whom  the  outer  world,  whether 
it  is  in  its  "  other  people,"  or  its  things,  or  its  facts,  or 
its  attractions  and  repulsions,  is  the  chief  source  of 
interest  and  these  are  the  objective  types,  exteriorized 
folks,  whose  values  lie  in  the  goods  they  can  accumulate, 
or  the  people  they  can  help,  or  the  external  power  they 
exercise,  or  the  knowledge  they  possess  of  the  phenomena 
of  the  world,  or  the  things  they  can  do  with  their  hands. 
These  are  on  the  whole  healthy-minded,  finding  in  their 
pursuits  and  interest  a  real  value,  rarely  stopping  from 
their  work  to  ask,  "  Why  do  I  work?  To  what  end? 
Are  things  real?"  Contrasted  with  them  are  those 
whose  gaze  is  turned  inward,  who  move  through  life  car- 
rying on  the  activities  of  the  average  existence  but  ab- 
sorbed in  their  thoughts,  their  emotions,  their  desires, 
their  conflicts,  —  perhaps  on  their  sensations  and 
coenaesthetic  streams.  Though  there  is  no  sharp  line  of 
division  between  the  two  types,  and  all  of  us  are  blends 
in  varying  degrees,  these  latter  are  the  subjective  intro- 
spective folk,  interiorized,  living  in  the  microcosmos, 
and  much  more  apt  than  the  objective  minded  to  be 
"  sick  souls  "  obsessed  with  "  whys  and  wherefores." 
They  are  endlessly  putting  to  themselves  unanswerable 

*  Herbert  Spencer's  description,  of  these  two  worlds  is  the  beet  in 
literature.     "  Principles  of  Psychology." 


134  THE  FOUNDATIONS  OF  PERSONALITY 

questions,  are  apt  to  be  the  mentally  unbalanced,  or, 
but  now  and  then,  they  furnish  the  race  with  one  whose 
answers  to  the  meaning  of  life  and  the  direction  of 
efforts  guide  the  steps  of  millions. 

There  is  a  good  and  a  bad  side  to  the  two  types  of 
interest.  The  objective  minded  conquer  the  world  in 
dealing  with  what  they  call  reality.  They  bridge  the 
water  and  dig  up  the  earth;  they  invent,  they  plow, 
they  sell  and  buy,  they  produce  and  distribute  wealth, 
and  they  deal  with  the  education  that  teaches  how  to 
do  all  these  things.  They  find  in  the  outer  world  an 
unalterable  sense  of  reality,  and  they  tend  rather 
naively  to  accept  themselves,  their  interests  and  efforts 
as  normal.  In  their  highest  forms  they  are  the  scien- 
tist, reducing  to  law  this  tangle  of  outer  realities,  or 
the  artist,  who  though  he  is  a  hybrid  with  deep  sub- 
jective and  objective  interest,  nevertheless  remodels  the 
outer  world  to  his  concept  of  beauty.  These  objective- 
minded  folk,  the  bulk  of  the  brawn  and  in  lesser  degree 
of  the  brain  of  the  world,  are  apt  to  be  "  materialists," 
to  value  mainly  quantity  and  to  be  self-complacent.  Of 
course,  since  no  man  is  purely  objective,  there  come  to 
them  as  to  all  moments  of  brooding  over  the  eggs  of 
their  inner  life,  when  they  wonder  whether  they  have 
reached  out  for  the  right  things  and  whether  the  goods 
they  seek  or  have  are  worth  while.  Such  introspective 
interest  comes  on  them  when  they  are  alone  and  the 
outer  world  does  not  reach  in,  or  when  they  have  wit- 
nessed death  and  misfortune,  or  when  sickness  and 
fatigue  have  reduced  them  to  a  feeling  of  weakness. 
For  it  is  true  that  the  objective  minded  are  more  often 
robust,  hearty,  with  more  natural  lust,  passion  and 
desire  than  your  introspectionists,  more  virile  and  less 
sensitive  to  fine  impressions. 


EXCITEMENT,  MONOTONY  AND  INTEREST  135 

The  introspectionists,  culling,  chewing  the  cud  of 
their  experiences  and  sensations,  find  in  their  own  reac- 
tions the  realities.  In  fact,  interested  in  consciousness, 
they  are  sometimes  bold  enough  to  deny  the  realities  of 
anything  else.  Where  the  others  build  bridges,  they 
build  up  the  ideas  of  eternal  good  and  bad,  of  beauty, 
of  the  transitory  and  the  permanent,  of  now  and  eter- 
nity. They  deal  with  abstract  ideas,  and  they  luxuriate 
in  emotions.  They  build  up  beliefs  where  thought  is 
the  only  reality  and  is  omnipotent.  They  are  the  foun- 
ders of  religions,  cults,  fads  and  fancies.  They  inculcate 
the  permanent  ideals,  because  they  are  the  only  ones 
who  interest  themselves  in  something  beside  the  show 
of  the  universe. 

But  too  often  they  are  the  sick  folk.  Without  the 
hardihood  and  the  energy  to  conquer  the  outer  world, 
they  fall  back  on  a  world  requiring  less  energy  to  study, 
less  energy  to  conquer.  Sometimes  they  develop  a  sense 
of  unreality  which  vitiates  all  their  efforts  to  succeed ; 
or  they  become  hypochondriacs,  feeling  every  flutter  of 
the  heart  and  every  vague  ache  and  pain.  The  Hamlet 
doubting  type  is  an  introspectionist  and  oscillates  in  his 
mind  from  yea  to  nay  on  every  question.  Such  as  this 
type  develop  ideas  of  compensation  and  power  and  be- 
come cranks  and  fake  prophets.  Or  else,  and  this  we 
shall  see  again,  they  become  imbued  with  a  sense  of  in- 
feriority, feel  futile  as  against  the  red-blooded  and  shrink 
from  others  through  pain. 

Everywhere  one  sees  these  phases  of  interest  in  an- 
tagonism and  cooperation.  The  "  healthy-minded " 
acknowledge  the  leadership  of  a  past  introspectionist 
but  despise  the  contemporary  one  as  futile  and  light- 
headed. The  introverted  (to  use  a  Freudian  term)  call 
the  others  Philistines,  and  mock  them  for  their  lack  of 


136  THE  FOUNDATIONS  OF  PERSONALITY 

spiritual  insight,  yet  in  everything  they  do  they  depend 
for  aid  and  sustenance  upon  them.  Introspection  gives 
no  exact  measurements  of  value,  but  it  gives  value  and 
without  it  there  can  be  no  wisdom.  But  always  it  needs 
the  correction  of  the  outer  world  to  keep  it  healthy. 

While  we  have  dealt  here  with  the  extremes  of  extro- 
spection  and  introspection,  it  is  safe  to  say  that  in  the 
vast  majority  of  people  there  is  a  definite  and  unassail- 
able interest  in  both  of  these  directions.  Interest  in 
others  is  not  altruism  and  interest  in  the  self  is  not 
self-interest  or  egoism.  But,  on  the  whole,  they  who 
are  not  interested  in  others  never  become  philanthro- 
pists; they  who  are  not  interested  in  things  never  be- 
come savants;  and  they  who  do  not  dig  deep  into  them- 
selves are  not  philosophers.  There  are,  therefore,  certain 
practical  aspects  to  the  study  of  interest  which  are 
essential  parts  of  the  knowledge  of  character. 

1.  Is  the  interest  of  the  one  studied  controlled  by  some 
purpose  or  purposes,  or  is  it  diffuse,  involuntary,  not 
well  directed? 

2.  Is  it  narrow,  so  that  it  excludes  the  greater  part 
of  the  world,  or  is  it  easily  evoked  by  a  multiplicity  of 
things?  In  the  breadth  of  interest  is  contained  the 
breadth  of  character,  but  not  necessarily  its  intensity 
or  efflciency.  There  are  people  of  narrow  but  intense 
successful  interest,  and  others  of  broad,  intense  success- 
ful interest,  but  one  meets,  too  frequently,  people 
quickly  interested  in  anything,  but  not  for  long  or  in 
a  practical  fashion.  There  is  a  certain  high  type  of 
failure  that  has  this  dififlculty. 

3.  Is  its  main  trend  outward,  and  if  so,  is  there  some 
special  feature  or  features  of  the  world  that  excite 
interest? 

4.  Is  its  main  trend  inward,  and  is  he  interested  in 


EXCITEMENT,  MONOTONY  AND  INTEREST  137 

emotions,  thoughts,  sensations,  —  in  his  mind  or  his 
body,  in  ideas  or  in  feelings?  For  it  is  obvious  that  the 
man  interested  in  his  ideas  is  quite  a  different  person 
than  he  who  is  keenly  aware  of  his  emotions,  and  that 
the  hypochondriac  belongs  in  a  class  by  himself. 

5.  If  there  are  special  interests,  how  do  these  har- 
monize with  ability  and  with  well-defined  plan  and  pur- 
pose. It  is  not  sufflcient  to  be  keenly  interested,  though 
that  is  necessary.  One  of  the  greatest  disharmonies  of 
life  is  when  a  man  is  interested  when  he  is  not  proficient, 
though  usually  proficiency  develops  interest  because  it 
gives  superiority  and  achievement. 

Interest  is  heightened  by  the  success  of  others,  for  we 
are  naturally  competitive  creatures,  or  by  admiration 
for  those  successful  in  any  line  of  activity.  The  desire 
to  emulate  or  excel  or  to  get  power  is  a  mighty  factor 
in  the  maintenance  of  interest.  "  See  how  nicely  Georgie 
does  it,"  is  a  formula  for  both  children  and  adults,  and 
if  omitted,  interest  would  not  be  easily  aroused  or  main- 
tained. In  other  words,  the  competitive  feeling  and  de- 
sire in  its  largest  sense  are  necessary  for  the  concen- 
trated excitement  of  interest.  So  any  scheme  of  social 
organization  that  proposes  to  do  away  with  competition 
and  desire  for  superiority  labors  under  the  psychologi- 
cal handicap  of  removing  the  basis  of  much  of  the  inter- 
est in  work  and  study  and  must  find  some  substitute 
for  the  lacking  incentives  before  it  can  seriously  ask 
for  the  adherence  of  those  with  a  realistic  view  of  human 
nature.  One  might,  it  is  true,  establish  traditions  of 
work,  bring  about  a  livelier  social  conscience  as  to  serv- 
ice, but  these  are  not  sufiScient  to  arouse  real  interest 
in  the  vast  majority  of  the  race.  Here  and  there  one 
finds  a  man  in  whom  interest  is  aroused  by  the  unsolved 
problem,  by  the  reward  of  fame  and  the  pleasure  of 


138  THE  FOUNDATIONS  OF  PERSONALITY 

achievement,  but  such  persons  are  rare.  The  average  man 
(and  woman),  in  my  experience,  loses  interest  in  any- 
thing that  does  not  directly  benefit  him  or  in  which  his 
personal  competitive  feeling  is  not  aroused.  Interest  be- 
comes vague  and  ill-defined  the  farther  the  matter  con- 
cerned is  from  the  direct  personal  good  of  the  individual, 
and  proportionately  it  becomes  difficult  to  sustain  it. 

That  is  why  in  our  day  "  dollars  and  cents  "  appeals 
to  interest  are  made;  away  with  abstracts,  away  with 
sentiment ;  the  publicity  man  working  for  a  good  cause 
now  uses  the  methods  of  the  man  selling  shoes  or  auto- 
mobiles: he  attempts  to  show  that  one's  interest  and 
cooperation  are  demanded  and  necessary  because  one's 
direct  personal  welfare  is  involved.  Whether  or  not 
ethically  justifiable,  it  is  a  recognition  of  the  fact  that 
interest  is  aroused  and  sustained,  for  the  majority,  by 
some  direct  personal  involvement. 

Thus  in  education,  a  fact  to  be  learned,  or  a  subject 
to  be  studied,  should  be  first  sketched  or  placed  in  some 
use  value  to  the  student.  Knowledge  for  knowledge's 
sake  is  appealing  only  to  the  rare  scholar,  he  who  pal- 
pitates with  interest  over  the  relationship  of  things  to 
one  another,  he  who  seeks  to  discover  values.  Now  and 
then  one  finds  such  a  person,  one  thrown  into  sustained 
excitement  by  learning,  but  the  great  majority  of  stu- 
dents, whether  in  medicine,  law  or  mathematics,  are 
"  practical,"  meaning  that  their  interests  are  relatively 
narrow  and  the  good  they  seek  an  immediate  one  to  be 
reaped  by  themselves.  Recognizing  this  fact  in  the  ab- 
stract, the  most  of  teaching  is  conducted  on  the  plane 
of  the  real  scholar,  and  the  average  student  is  left  to 
find  values  for  himself.  From  first  to  last  in  teaching 
I  would  emphasize  usevalue;  true,  I  would  seek  to 
broaden  the  conception  of  usevalue,  so  that  a  student 


EXCITEMENT,  MONOTONY  AND  INTEREST  139 

would  see  that  usefulness  is  a  social  value,  but  no  mat- 
ter how  abstract  and  remote  the  subject,  its  relationship 
to  usefulness  would  be  preliminary  and  continuously 
emphasized  in  order  to  sustain  interest. 

Interest,  like  any  other  form  of  excitement,  needs  new 
stimuli  and  periods  of  relaxation.  People  under  the 
driving  force  of  necessity  continue  at  their  work  for 
longer  periods  of  time  and  more  constantly  than  is 
psychologically  possible  for  the  maintaining  of  interest. 
So  it  disappears,  and  then  fatigue  sets  in  at  once,  —  a 
fatigue  that  is  increased  by  the  effort  to  work  and  the 
regret  and  rebellion  at  the  change.  The  memory  seems 
to  suffer  and  a  fear  is  aroused  that  "  I  am  losing  my 
memory " ;  the  threat  to  success  brings  anguish  and 
often  the  health  becomes  definitely  impaired.  Overcon- 
centrated,  too  long  maintenance  of  interest  brings 
apathy,  —  an  apathy  that  cannot  be  dispelled  except  by 
change  and  rest.  Here  there  is  wide  individual  varia- 
tion from  those  who  need  frequent  change  and  relaxa- 
tion periods  to  those  who  can  maintain  interest  in  a 
task  almost  indefinitely. 

A  hobby,  or  a  secondary  object  of  interest,  is  there- 
fore a  real  necessity  to  the  man  or  woman  battling  for 
a  purpose,  whose  interest  must  be  sustained.  It  acts 
to  relax,  to  shift  the  excitement  and  to  allow  something 
of  the  feeling  of  novelty  as  one  reapproaches  the  task. 

As  a  matter  of  fact,  excitement  and  interest  are  not 
easily  separated  from  their  derivatives  and  elaborations. 
Desire,  purpose,  ambition,  imply  a  force ;  interest  implies 
a  direction  for  that  force.  Interest  may  be  as  casual 
as  curiosity  aroused  by  the  novel  and  strange,  or  as 
deep-seated  and  specialized  as  a  talent.  The  bom 
teacher  is  he  who  knows  how  to  arouse  and  maintain 
and  direct  interest ;  the  born  achiever  is  the  man  whose 


140  THE  FOUNDATIONS  OF  PERSONALITY 

interest,  quickly  aroused,  is  easily  maintained  and  di- 
rects effort.  To  find  the  activity  that  is  natively  inter- 
esting and  yet  suited  to  one's  ability  is  the  aim  in 
vocational  guidance. 

There  are  some  curious  pathological  aspects  to  inter- 
est —  "  conflict "  aspects  of  the  subject.  A  man  finds 
himself  palpitatingly  interested  in  what  is  horrible  to 
him,  as  a  bird  is  fascinated  by  a  snake.  Sex  abnormal- 
ities have  a  marvelous  interest  to  everybody,  although 
many  will  not  admit  it.  Stories  of  crime  and  bloodshed 
are  read  by  everybody  with  great  avidity,  —  and  people 
will  go  miles  to  the  site  of  grim  tragedy.  Court  rooms 
are  packed  whenever  a  horrible  murder  is  aired  or  a 
nauseating  divorce  scandal  is  tried.  A  chaste  woman 
will  read,  on  the  sly  and  with  inner  rebellion,  as  many 
pornographic  tales  as  she  can  get  hold  of,  and  the  "  care- 
fully "  brought  up,  i.  e.,  those  whose  interest  has  been 
carefully  directed,  suddenly  become  interested  in  the 
forbidden ;  they  seek  to  peek  through  windows  when  they 
should  be  looking  straight  ahead. 

As  a  matter  of  fact,  interest  is  as  much  inhibited  as 
conduct.  "  You  mustn't  ask  about  that "  is  the  com- 
monest answer  a  child  gets.  "  That's  a  naughty  question 
to  ask  "  runs  it  a  close  second.  Can  one  inhibit  interest, 
which  is  the  excitement  caused  by  the  unknown?  The 
answer  is  that  we  can,  because  a  large  part  of  education 
is  to  do  this  very  thing.  "  Can  we  inhibit  any  interest 
without  injuring  all  interests? "  is  a  question  often 
put.  My  answer  would  be  that  it  is  socially  necessary 
that  interest  in  certain  directions  be  inhibited,  whether 
it  hurts  the  individual  or  not.  But  the  interest  in  a  for- 
bidden direction  can  be  shifted  to  a  permitted  direction, 
and  this  should  be  done.  In  my  opinion,  sex  interest 
can  be  so  handled  and  a  blunt  thwarting  of  this  interest 


EXCITEMENT,  MONOTONY  AND  INTEREST  141 

should  be  avoided.  Some  explanation  leading  the  child 
to  larger,  less  personal  aspects  of  sex  should  be  given. 

The  interest  of  the  child  is  often  thwarted  through 
sheer  laziness.  "  Don't  bother  me  "  is  the  reply  of  a 
parent  shirking  a  sacred  duty.  Interest  is  the  begin- 
ning of  knowledge,  and  where  it  is  discouraged  knowl- 
edge is  discouraged.  Any  inquiry  can  be  met  on  the 
child's  plane  of  intelligence  and  comprehension,  and  the 
parent  must  arrange  for  the  gratification  of  this  fun- 
damental desire.  How?  By  a  question  hour  each  day, 
perhaps  a  children's  hour,  a  home  university  period 
where  the  vital  interest  of  the  child  will  be  satisfied. 

To  return  to  the  morbid  interests :  do  they  arise  from 
secret  morbid  desires?  The  Freudian  answer  to  that 
would  be  yes.  And  so  would  many  another  answer. 
It  is  the  answer  in  many  cases,  especially  where  the 
desire  is  not  so  much  morbid  as  forbidden.  The  virgin, 
the  continent  who  are  intensely  interested  in  sex  are 
not  morbid,  even  though  they  have  been  forbidden  to 
think  of  a  natural  craving  and  appetite.  But  when  the 
interest  is  for  the  horrible  it  is  often  the  case  that  the 
excitement  aroused  by  the  subject  is  pleasurable,  be- 
cause it  is  a  mild  excitement  and  does  not  quite  reach 
disgust.  Confronted  with  the  real  perversity,  the  dis- 
gust aroused  would  quite  effectually  conquer  interest. 

And  here  is  a  fundamental  law  of  interest:  it  must 
lead  to  a  profitable,  pleasurable  result  or  else  it  tends 
to  disappear.  If  this  is  too  bold  a  statement,  let  me 
qualify  it  by  stating  that  a  profitable,  pleasurable  result 
must  be  foreseen  or  foreseeable.  Either  in  some  affec- 
tive state,  or  in  some  tangible  good,  interest  seeks  fulfill- 
ment. Disappointment  is  the  foe  of  interest,  and  too 
prolonged  a  "vestibule  of  satisfaction"  (to  use  Hock- 
ing's phrase)  destroys  or  impairs  interest. 


CHAPTER  VIII 

THE   SENTIMENTS  OP  LOVE,    FRIENDSHIP,   HATE,   PITY   AND 
DUTY.  COMPENSATION  AND  ESCAPE 

I  SHALL  ignore  the  complexities  that  arise  when  we 
seek  to  organize  our  reactions  into  various  groups  by 
making  a  simple  classification  of  feeling,  for  the  pur- 
poses of  this  book.  There  is  a  primary  result  of  any 
stimulation,  whether  from  within  ourselves  or  without, 
which  we  have  called  excitement.  This  excitement  may 
have  a  pleasurable  or  an  unpleasurable  quality,  and 
we  cannot  understand  just  what  is  back  of  pleasure  and 
pain  in  this  sense.  Such  an  explanation,  that  pleasure 
is  a  sign  of  good  for  the  organism  and  pain  a  sign  of  bad, 
is  an  error  in  that  often  an  experience  that  produces 
pleasure  is  a  detriment  and  an  injury.  If  pleasure 
were  an  infallible  sign  of  good,  no  books  on  character, 
morals  or  hygiene  would  need  to  be  written. 

This  primary  excitement,  when  associated  with  outer 
events  or  things,  becomes  differentiated  into  many 
forms.  Curiosity  (or  interest)  is  the  focusing  of  that 
excitement  on  particular  objects  or  ends,  in  order  that 
the  essential  value  or  meaning  of  that  object  or  indi- 
vidual become  known.  Curiosity  and  interest  develop 
into  the  seeking  of  experience  and  the  general  intel- 
lectual pursuits.  We  have  already  discussed  this  phase 
of  excitement. 

An  object  of  interest  may  then  evoke  further  feeling. 
It  may  be  one's  baby,  or  one's  father  or  a  kinsman  or  a 


THE  SENTIMENTS  OP  LOVE  AND  HATE  143 

female  of  the  same  species.  A  type  of  feeling  favorable 
to  the  object  is  aroused,  called  "  tender  feeling,"  which 
is  associated  with  deep-lying  instincts  and  has  endless 
modifications  and  variations.  Perhaps  its  great  exam- 
ple is  the  tender  feeling  of  the  mother  for  the  baby, 
a  feeling  so  strong  that  it  leads  to  conduct  of  self- 
sacrifice;  conduct  that  makes  nothing  of  privation,  suf- 
fering, even  death,  if  these  will  help  the  object  of  the 
tender  feeling,  the  child.  Tender  feeling  of  this  type, 
which  we  call  love,  is  a  theme  one  cannot  discuss  dryly, 
for  it  sweeps  one  into  reveries;  it  suggests  softly  glow- 
ing eyes,  not  far  from  tears,  tenderly  curved  lips,  just 
barely  smiling,  and  the  soft  humming  of  the  mother  to 
the  babe  in  her  arms.  It  is  the  soft  feeling  which  is 
the  unifying  feeling,  and  when  it  reaches  a  group  they 
become  gentle  in  tone  and  manners  and  feel  as  one. 
The  dream  of  the  reformer  has  always  been  the  exten- 
sion of  this  tender  feeling  from  the  baby,  from  the 
child  and  the  helpless,  to  all  men,  thus  abolishing  strife, 
conquering  hate,  unifying  man.  This  type  of  love  is 
also  paternal,  though  it  is  doubtful  whether  as  such  it 
ever  reaches  the  intensity  it  does  in  the  mother.  By  a 
sort  of  association  it  spreads  to  all  children,  to  all  little 
things,  to  all  helpless  things,  except  where  there  exists 
a  counter  feeling  already  well  established. 

Though  typical  in  the  mother,  child  relationship,  ten- 
der feeling  or  love,  exists  in  many  other  relationships. 
The  human  family,  with  its  close  association,  its  incul- 
cated unity  of  interests,  in  its  highest  form  is  based 
on  the  tender  feeling.  The  noble  ideal  of  the  brother- 
hood of  man  comes  from  an  extension  of  the  feeling 
found  in  brothers.  The  brotherly  feeling  is  empha- 
sized, though  the  sisterly  feeling  is  fully  as  strong, 
merely  because  the  male  member  of  genus  homo  has 


144  THE  FOUNDATIONS  OF  PERSONALITY 

been  the  articulate  member,  he  has  written  and  talked 
as  if  he,  and  not  his  sister,  were  the  important  human 
personage.  So  fraternal  feeling  is  tender  feeling,  exist- 
ing between  members  of  the  same  family,  or  the  love  that 
we  conceive  ought  to  be  present.  Is  such  love  instinc- 
tive, as  is  the  maternal  love?  If  it  is,  that  instinct  is 
very  much  weaker,  and  hostile  feeling,  indifference, 
rivalry,  may  easily  replace  it.  We  rarely  conceive  of 
a  mortal  world  where  so  intense  a  love  as  that  of  the 
mother  will  be  the  common  feeling ;  all  we  dare  hope  for 
is  a  world  in  which  there  will  be  a  fine  fraternal  feeling. 

Fraternal  feeling  is  born  of  association  together,  any 
task  undertaken  en  masse,  any  living  together  under 
one  roof.  Even  when  men  sit  down  to  eat  at  the  same 
table,  it  tends  to  appear.  So  college  life,  the  barracks, 
secret  orders,  awaken  it,  but  here,  as  always,  while  it 
links  together  the  associated,  it  shuts  out  as  non- 
fraternal  those  not  associated. 

What  we  call  friendly  feeling  is  a  less  vehement,  more 
intellectualized  form  of  tender  feeling.  It  demands  a 
certain  equality  and  a  certain  similarity  in  tastes, 
though  some  friendships  are  noted  for  the  dissimilarity 
of  the  friends.  Friendship  lives  on  reciprocal  benefits, 
tangible  or  intangible,  though  sentimentalists  may  take 
exception  to  this.  Primary  in  it  is  the  good  opinion  of 
the  friends  and  interest  in  one  another;  we  cannot  be 
friends  with  those  who  think  we  are  foolish  or  mean 
or  bad.  We  allow  a  friend  to  say  that  we  have  acted 
wrongly  because  we  think  he  has  our  interest  at  heart, 
because  he  has  shown  that  he  has  this  interest  at  heart, 
though  his  saying  so  sometimes  strains  the  friendship 
for  a  while.  Friendship  ideally  expects  no  material 
benefits,  but  it  lives  on  the  spiritual  benefit  of  sympathy 


THE  SENTIMENTS  OF  LOVE  AND  HATE  145 

and  expressed  interest  and  the  flattery  of  a  taste  in 
common.  It  is  a  unification  of  individuals  that  has 
been  glorified  as  the  perfect  relationship,  since  it  has 
no  classifiable  instinct  behind  it  and  is  in  a  sense  democ- 
racy at  its  noblest.  Friendship  is  easiest  formed  in 
youth,  because  men  are  least  selfish,  least  specialized 
at  that  time.  As  time  goes  on,  alas,  our  own  interests 
and  purposes  narrow  down  in  order  that  we  may  suc- 
ceed; there  is  less  time  and  energy  for  friendship. 

Sex  love  is  only  in  part  made  up  of  tender  feeling. 
Passion,  admiration  of  beauty,  desire  of  possession,  the 
love  of  conquest,  take  away  from  the  "  other  "  feeling 
that  is  the  basis  of  tenderness  or  true  love.  We  desire 
so  much  for  ourselves  in  sex  love  that  we  have  not  so 
much  capacity  for  tender  feeling  as  we  usually  think 
we  have.  The  protests  of  eternal  devotion  and  unend- 
ing self-sacrifice  are  sincere  enough  but  they  have  this 
proviso  in  the  background :  "  You  must  give  yourself  to 
me."  If  the  lovers  can  also  be  friends,  if  they  have  a 
real  harmony  of  tastes,  desires  and  ambitions,  if  they 
can  recede  their  ego  feeling,  know  how  to  compromise, 
then  this  added  to  sex  feeling  makes  the  most  genuinely 
satisfying  of  all  human  relations,  or  at  least  the  most 
reciprocal.  But  the  two  human  beings  who  fall  in  love 
are  rarely  enough  alike,  and  their  relationship  is  rarely 
one  of  equality;  traditional  duties  and  rights  are  not 
equal;  they  will  seek  different  things,  and  their  rela- 
tionship is  too  close  and  intimate  to  be  an  easy  one 
to  maintain.  Sex  love  and  marriage  are  different  mat- 
ters, for  though  they  may  be  the  same,  too  often  they 
are  not.  Karely  does  sex  love  maintain  itself  without 
marriage  and  marriage  colors  over  sex  love  with  paren- 
tal feelings,  financial  interests,  home  and  its  emotions, 


146  THE  FOUNDATIONS  OF  PERSONALITY 

etc.  In  sex  gratification  ^  there  is  the  danger  of  all 
sensuous  pleasure:  that  a  periodic  appetite  gratified 
often  leaves  behind  it  an  ennui,  a  distaste, —  sometimes 
reaching  dislike  —  of  the  entire  act  and  associations. 

Is  all  tender  feeling,  all  love,  sexual  in  its  essential 
nature?  The  Freudians  say  yes  to  this,  or  what 
amounts  to  yes.  All  mother  love  arises  from  the  sex 
sphere,  and  it  cannot  be  denied  that  in  the  passionate 
desire  to  fondle,  to  kiss  and  even  to  bite  there  is  some- 
thing very  like  the  excitement  of  sex.  But  there  is  some- 
thing very  different  in  the  wish  for  self-sacrifice,  the 
pity  for  the  helpless  state,  the  love  of  the  littleness. 
Women,  when  they  love  men,  often  add  maternal  feel- 
ing to  it,  but  mainly  they  love  their  strength,  size  and 
vigor;  and  there  tenderness  and  passion  differ.  Cer- 
tainly there  seems  little  of  the  sexual  in  the  love  of  a 
father  for  his  baby,^  though  the  Freudians  do  not  hesi- 
tate in  their  use  of  the  term  homosexual.  Apparently 
all  children  have  incestuous  desire  for  their  parents,  if 
we  are  to  trust  Freud.  Without  entering  into  detailed 
reasoning,  I  disavow  any  truly  sexual  element  in  tender 
feeling.  It  is  part  of  the  reception  we  give  to  objects 
having  a  favorable  relation  to  ourselves.  Indeed,  we 
give  it  to  our  houses,  our  dogs,  our  cattle;  our  pipes 
are  hallowed  by  friendly  association,  and  so  with  our 
books,  our  clothes  and  our  homes.  We  extend  it  in  deep, 

*  Stanley  Hall  says  that  after  sex  gratification  there  is  "  tsedium 
vitae,"  weariness  of  life.  In  unsanctioned  sex  gratification  this  is 
extreme  and  takes  on  either  bitter  self-reproach  or  else  a  hate  of  the 
partner.     But  this  is  due  to  the  inner  conflict  rather  than  the  sex  act. 

'It's  a  very  difficult  world  to  live  in,  if  we  are  to  trust  the  Freud- 
ians. If  your  boy  child  loves  his  mother,  that's  heterosexual;  if  he 
loves  his  father,  that's  homosexual;  and  the  love  of  a  girl  child  for  her 
parents  simply  reverses  the  above  formula.  If  your  wife  says  of  the 
baby  boy,  "How  I  love  him!  He  looks  just  like  my  father,"  be  care- 
ful; that's  a  daughter-father  complex  of  a  dangerous  kind  and  means 
the  most  unhallowed  things,  and  may  cause  her  to  have  a  nervous 
breakdown  some  day! 


THE  SENTIMENTS  OF  LOVE  AND  HATE  147 

full  measure  to  the  very  rocks  and  rills  of  our  native 
land  or  to  some  place  where  we  spent  happy  or  tender 
days.  Tender  feeling,  love,  is  inclusive  of  much  of  the 
sex  emotion,  and  the  characteristic  mistake  of  the 
Freudians  of  identifying  somewhat  similar  things  has 
here  been  made. 

Love,  then,  is  this  tender  feeling  made  purposive  and 
intelligent.  It  is  a  sentiment,  in  Shand's  phrase,  and 
seeks  the  good  of  its  object.  It  may  be  narrow,  it  may 
be  broad,  it  may  be  intense  or  feeble,  but  in  its  organized 
sense  it  plans,  fights  and  cherishes.  It  has  organized 
with  it  the  primary  emotions,  —  fear  if  the  object  is  in 
danger,  or  anger  is  evoked  according  to  the  circumstan- 
ces ;  joy  if  the  object  of  love  is  enhanced  or  prospers ;  sor- 
row if  it  is  lost  or  injured  under  circumstances  that  make 
the  lover  helpless.  Love  is  not  only  the  tenderest  feel- 
ing, but  it  is  also  the  most  heroic  and  desperate  fighter 
in  behalf  of  the  loved  one.  Here  we  are  face  to  face 
with  the  contradictions  that  we  always  meet  when  we 
personify  a  quality  or  make  an  abstraction.  Love  may 
do  the  most  hateful  things ;  love  may  stunt  the  character 
of  the  lover  and  the  beloved.  In  other  words,  love, 
tender  feeling,  must  be  conjoined  with  intelligence,  good 
judgment,  determination  and  fairness  before  it  is  use- 
ful. It  would  be  a  nice  question  to  determine  just  how 
much  harm  misguided  love  has  done. 

What  is  pity?  Though  objects  of  love  always  elicit 
pity,  when  helpless  or  injured,  objects  of  pity  are  not 
necessarily  objects  of  love.  In  fact,  we  may  pity 
through  contempt.  Objective  pity  is  a  type  of  tender 
feeling  in  which  there  is  little  or  no  self-feeling.  We 
do  not  extend  the  ego  to  the  piteous  object.  We  desire 
to  help,  even  though  the  object  of  pity  is  an  enemy  or 
disgusting.     One  of  the  commonest  struggles  of  life  is 


148  THE  FOUNDATIONS  OF  PERSONALITY 

that  between  self-interest  and  pity,  —  and  the  selfish 
resent  any  situation  that  arouses  their  pity,  because 
they  dislike  to  give.  Pity  tends  to  disappear  from  the 
life  of  the  soldier  and  is,  indeed,  a  trait  he  does  not  need ; 
in  the  lives  of  the  strong  and  successful,  pity  is  apt  to 
be  a  hindering  quality.  In  a  world  in  which  competi- 
tion is  keen,  the  cooperative  gentle  qualities  hinder  suc- 
cess. The  weak  seek  the  pity  of  others;  they  need  it; 
and  the  pity-seeker  is  a  very  distinct  type.  The  strong 
and  proud  hate  to  be  pitied,  and  when  wounded  they 
hide,  shun  their  friends  and  keep  the  semblance  of 
strength  with  a  brave  face.  Pity  directed  toward  one- 
self as  the  object  is  self-pity, —  a  quality  found  in  chil- 
dren and  in  a  certain  amiable,  weak,  egoistic  type,  whose 
eyes  are  always  full  of  tears  as  they  talk  of  themselves. 
Of  course,  at  times,  we  are  all  prone  to  this  vice  of  char- 
acter, but  there  are  some  chronically  afflicted. 

Certain  so-called  sentimentalists  are  those  who  dis- 
tribute their  pity  in  an  erratic  fashion.  These  are  the 
vegetarians  who  are  sad  because  it  is  wrong  to  kill  for 
food ;  yet  they  wear  without  compunction  the  leather  of 
cattle  who  have  neither  committed  suicide  nor  died  of 
old  age.  And  the  anti-vivisectionists  view  without  any 
stir  of  pity  the  children  of  the  slums  and  the  sick  of  all 
kinds.  Pity  raises  man  to  the  divine  but,  like  all  the 
gentle  qualities,  it  needs  guidance  by  reason  and  com- 
mon sense  before  it  is  of  any  value. 

Just  as  there  are  objects  and  individuals  recognized 
or  believed  to  be  as  somehow  favorable  and  who  evoke 
tender  feeling,  so  there  are  objects  and  individuals  re- 
garded as  unfavorable,  perhaps  dangerous,  who  arouse 
aversion  and  hatred.  The  feeling  thus  produced  is  the 
other  great  sentiment  of  life,  which  on  the  whole  organ- 
izes character  and  conduct  on  a  great  plane.    Hatred,  a 


THE  SENTIMENTS  OP  LOVE  AND  HATE  149 

decidedly  primitive  reaction,  still  is  powerful  in  the 
world  and  is  back  of  dissension  of  all  kinds,  from  law- 
suits to  war.  When  one  hates  he  is  attached  to  the 
hated  object  in  a  fashion  just  the  reverse  of  the  attach- 
ment of  love;  joy,  anger,  fear  and  sorrow  arise  under 
exactly  the  opposite  circumstances,  and  the  aim  and 
end  of  hate  is  to  block,  thwart  and  destroy  the  hated 
one.  The  earlier  history  of  man  lays  emphasis  on  the 
activities  of  hate,  —  war,  feats  of  arms,  individual 
feuds.  Hate,  unlike  love,  needs  no  moral  code  or  teach- 
ing to  bring  it  into  activity ;  it  springs  into  being  and 
constantly  needs  repression.  Unlikeness  alone  often 
brings  it  to  life ;  to  be  too  different  from  others  is  rec- 
ognized as  a  legitimate  reason  for  hatred.  The  most 
important  cause  is  conflict  of  interest  and  wounding 
of  self -feeling  and  pride.  Revengeful  feeling,  fostered 
by  tradition  and  "  patriotism,"  caused  many  wars  and 
in  its  lesser  spheres  of  operation  is  back  of  murders, 
assaults,  insults  and  the  lesser  categories  of  injuries 
of  all  kinds. 

The  prime  emotion  of  hatred  is  anger;  in  its  less 
intense  aspect  of  aversion  it  is  disgust.  The  aim  and 
end  of  anger  is  destruction  of  the  offending  object ;  the 
aim  and  end  of  aversion  is  removal,  ejection.  Hate 
may  be  and  often  is  a  noble  sentiment,  though  the  trend 
of  modern  thought,  as  it  minimizes  personal  responsi- 
bility, is  to  eliminate  hate  against  persons  and  intel- 
lectualize  hate  so  that  it  is  reserved  for  the  battle 
against  ideas.  Whether  you  can  really  summon  all  your 
effort  against  any  one,  against  his  plans,  opinions  and 
actions,  unless  you  have  built  up  the  steady  sentiment 
of  hatred  for  him,  is  a  nice  p^chological  question. 
Hate  is  most  intense  in  little  people,  in  persons  abso- 
lutely convinced  that  their  interests,  opinions  and  plans 


150  THE  FOUNDATIONS  OF  PERSONALITY 

are  sacred,  sure  of  their  superiority  and  righteousness. 
Once  let  insight  into  yourself,  your  weakness  and  your 
real  motives  creep  into  your  mind  and  your  hate  against 
opponents  and  obstructors  must  lessen.  Those  who 
realize  most  the  fallibility  of  men  and  women,  to  whom 
Pilate's  question  "  What  is  truth  ?  "  has  added  to  it  a 
more  sceptical  question,  "  What  is  right,"  find  it  hard 
to  hate.  Therefore,  such  persons,  the  broad-minded  and 
the  most  deeply  wise,  are  not  the  best  fighters  for  a 
cause,  since  their  efforts  are  lessened  by  sympathy  for 
the  opponent.  Here  is  the  marvel  of  Abraham  Lincoln ; 
rich  with  insight,  he  could  hate  slavery  and  secession 
and  yet  not  hate  the  southern  people.  In  that  division 
of  himself  lies  his  greatness  and  his  suffering. 

The  disappearance  of  personal  hate  from  the  world 
can  only  come  when  men  realize  the  essential  unity  of 
mankind.  For  part  of  the  psychological  origin  of  hate 
lies  in  unlikeness.  Great  unlikeness  in  color  and  facial 
line  seems  to  act  as  a  challenge  to  the  feeling  of  superior- 
ity. Wherever  a  "  different "  group  challenges  an- 
other's superiority,  or  enters  into  active  competition 
for  the  goods  of  life,  there  hate  enters  in  its  most  viru- 
lent form.  The  disappearance  of  the  "  unlike  "  feeling 
is  very  slow  and  is  hindered  by  the  existence  of  small 
"  particular "  groups.  Little  nationalities,^  small 
sects,  even  exclusive  clubs  and  circles  are  means  of  gen- 
erating difference  and  thus  hate. 

We  shall  not  enter  into  the  origin  of  hate  through  the 
danger  to  purpose,  through  rivalry  among  those  not 
separated  by  unlikeness.  Hate  seems  to  be  a  chronic 
anger,  or  at  least  that  emotion  kept  at  a  more  or  less 
constant  level  by  perception  of  danger  and  the  threat 

^  The  more  nationalities,  each  with  its  claim  to  a  great  destiny,  the 
more  wars!  There  is  the  essential  danger  and  folly  of  tribal  patriot- 
ism. 


THE  SENTIMENTS  OF  LOVE  AND  HATE  151 

at  personal  dignity  and  worth.  Obstructed  love  or  pas- 
sion and  the  feeling  of  "  wrong,"  i.  e.,  injury  done  that 
was  not  merited,  that  the  personal  conscience  does  not 
justify,  furnish  the  most  virulent  types  of  hatred, 
"  Love  thine  enemies  "  is  still  an  impossible  injunction 
for  most  men. 

We  cannot  hope  to  trace  the  feeling  of  revenge  in  its 
effects  on  human  conduct.  Though  at  present  religion 
and  law  both  prohibit  revengeful  acts,  the  desire  "  to 
get  even"  flames  high  in  almost  every  human  breast 
under  all  kinds  of  injury  or  insult.  This  form  of  hate 
may  express  itself  crudely  in  the  vendetta  of  the  Sicil- 
ian, the  feud  of  the  Tennessee  mountaineer,  or  the  as- 
sault and  battery  of  an  aggrieved  husband ;  it  is  behind 
the  present-day  conflict  in  Ireland,  and  it  threatened 
Europe  for  forty  years  after  the  Franco-Prussian  War, 
—  and  no  man  knows  how  profoundly  it  will  influence 
future  world  affairs  because  of  the  Great  War.  Often 
it  disguises  itself  as  justice,  the  principle  of  the  thing, 
in  those  who  will  not  admit  revenge  as  a  motive ;  and  the 
eclipsed  and  beaten  take  revenge  in  slander,  innuendo 
and  double-edged  praise.  To  some  revenge  is  a  devil 
to  be  fought  out  of  their  hearts;  to  others  it  is  a  god 
that  guides  every  act.  We  may  define  nobility  of  char- 
acter as  the  withdrawal  from  revenge  as  a  motive  and 
the  substitution  for  it  of  justice. 

Some  hatred  expresses  itself  openly  and  fearlessly 
and  as  such  gains  some  respect,  even  from  its  own  ob- 
ject. Other  hatred  plots  and  schemes,  the  intelligence 
lends  itself  to  the  plans  completely  and  the  whole  per- 
sonality suffers  in  consequence.  Some  hatred,  weak 
and  without  self-confidence,  or  seeking  the  effect  of 
surprise,  is  hypocritical,  dissimulates,  affects  friendly 
feeling,   rubs  its  hands  over  insults  and  awaits  the 


152  THE  FOUNDATIONS  OF  PEKSONALITY 

opportune  moment.  This  type  is  associated  in  all 
minds  with  a  feeling  of  disgust,  for  at  bottom  we  rather 
admire  the  "  good  "  hater. 

We  have  spoken  of  these  three  specialized  and  di- 
rected outgrowths  of  excitement,  interest,  love  and 
hatred  as  if  they  were  primarily  directed  to  the  out- 
side world,  though  in  a  previous  chapter  we  discussed 
the  introspective  interest.  What  shall  we  call  the  love 
and  hatred  a  man  has  for  himself?  Is  the  self -regard- 
ing sentiment  any  different  than  the  sentiment  of  love 
for  others?  Is  that  hate  and  disgust  we  feel  for  our- 
selves, or  for  some  action  or  thought,  different  from  the 
hate  and  disgust  we  have  for  others? 

Judged  by  Shand's  dicta  that  anger  and  fear  are 
aroused  if  the  object  of  love  is  threatened,  joy  is  aroused 
as  it  prospers,  and  sorrow  if  it  is  deeply  injured  or  lost, 
self-love  remarkably  resembles  other-love.  The  pride 
we  take  in  our  own  achievements  is  unalloyed  by 
jealousy,  and  there  is  always  a  trace  of  jealousy  in  the 
pride  we  take  in  the  achievements  of  others,  but  there 
is  no  difference  in  the  pride  itself.  There  is  no  essen- 
tial difference  in  the  "  good  "  we  seek  for  ourselves 
and  in  the  good  we  seek  for  others,  for  what  we  seek 
will  depend  on  our  idea  of  "  good."  Thus  the  ambitious 
mother  seeks  for  her  daughter  a  rich  husband  and  the 
idealist  seeks  for  his  son  a  career  of  devotion  to  the 
ideal.  And  the  sensualist  devoted  to  the  good  of  his 
belly  and  his  pocket  loves  his  child  and  shows  it  by 
feeding  and  enriching  him. 

There  seems  to  be  lacking,  however,  the  glow  of  ten-    . 
der  feeling  in  self-love.     The  projection  of  the  self -in-    \ 
terest  to  others  has  a  passion,  a  melting  in  it  that  self- 
love  never  seems  to  possess,  though  it  may  be  constant 
and  ever-operating.     Self-regard,  self -admiration  or  con- 


THE  SENTIMENTS  OF  LOVE  AND  HATE  153 

ceit  may  be  very  high  and  deeply  felt,  but  though 
more  common  than  real  admiration  for  others,  it  seldom 
reaches  the  awe  and  reverence  that  the  projected  emo- 
tion reaches. 

In  mental  disease,  of  the  type  known  as  Maniac  De- 
pressive insanity,  there  is  a  curious  oscillation  of  self- 
love  and  self-admiration.  This  disease  is  cyclic,  in  that 
two  opposing  groups  of  symptoms  tend  to  appear  and 
displace  each  other.  In  the  manic,  or  excited  state, 
there  is  greatly  heightened  activity  with  correspondingly 
heightened  feeling  of  power.  Self-love  and  admiration 
reach  absurd  levels :  one  is  the  most  beautiful,  the  rich- 
est and  wisest  of  persons,  infallible,  irresistible,  aye, 
perhaps  God  or  Christ.  Sometimes  the  feeling  of 
grandeur,  the  euphoria,  is  less  fantastic  and  the  patient 
imagines  himself  a  great  inventor,  a  statesman  of  power 
and  wisdom,  a  writer  of  renown,  etc.  Suddenly,  or 
perhaps  gradually,  the  change  comes ;  self-feeling  drops 
into  an  abyss.  "  I  am  the  most  miserable  of  persons, 
the  vilest  sinner,  hated  and  rightly  by  God  and  man, 
cause  of  suffering  and  misery.  I  am  no  good,  no  use,  a 
horrible  odor  issues  from  me,  I  am  loathsome  to  look 
at,  etc.,  etc."  Desperate  suicidal  attempts  are  made, 
and  all  the  desires  that  tend  to  preserve  the  individual 
disappear,  including  appetite  for  food  and  drink,  the 
power  to  sleep.  It  is  the  most  startling  of  transitions ; 
one  can  hardly  realize  that  the  dejected,  silent  person, 
sitting  in  a  comer,  hiding  his  face  and  hardly  breath- 
ing, is  the  same  individual  who  lately  tore  around  the 
wards,  happy,  dancing,  singing  and  boasting  of  his 
greatness  of  power.  Indeed,  is  he  the  same  individual? 
No  wonder  the  ancients  regarded  such  insanity  as  a 
possession  by  an  evil  spirit.  We  of  a  later  day  who 
deal  with  this  disease  on  the  whole  are  inclined  to  the 


154  THE  FOUNDATIONS  OF  PERSONALITY 

belief  that  some  internal  factor  of  a  physical  kind  is 
responsible,  some  neuronic  shift,  or  some  strange,  vis- 
ceral endocrinal  disorder. 

While  self-hate  in  this  pathological  aspect  is  rela- 
tively uncommon,  in  every  person  there  are  self-critical, 
self-condemning  activities  which  sometimes  for  short 
periods  of  time  reach  self-hatred  and  disgust.  Mc- 
Dougall  makes  a  good  deal  of  the  self-abasing  instinct 
which  makes  us  lower  ourselves  gladly  and  willingly. 
This  seems  to  me  to  be  an  aspect  of  the  emotion  of  ad- 
miration and  wonder,  for  we  do  not  wish  ordinarily  to 
kneel  at  the  feet  of  the  insignificant,  debased;  or  it  is 
an  aspect  of  fear  and  the  effort  to  obtain  conciliation 
and  pity.  But  the  establishment  of  ideals  for  our- 
selves to  which  we  are  not  faithful  brings  with  it  a  dis- 
gust and  loathing  for  self  that  is  extremely  painful  and 
leads  to  a  desire  for  penance  of  any  kind  hi  order  that 
we  may  punish  ourselves  and  feel  that  we  have  made 
amends.  The  capacity)  for  self-hate  and  self-disgust 
depends  largely  upon  the  development  of  these  ideals 
and  principles  of  conscience,  of  expectation  of  the  self. 
Frequently  there  is  an  overrigidity,  a  ceaseless  self- 
examination  that  now  and  then  produces  miracles  of 
character  and  achievement  but  more  often  brings  the 
breakdown  of  health.  This  is  the  seeker  of  perfection 
In  himself,  who  will  not  compromise  with  his  instincts 
and  his  human  flesh.  These  seekers  of  perfection  are 
among  the  noblest  of  the  race,  admired  in  the  abstract 
but  condemned  by  their  friends  as  "  too  good,"  "  im- 
practical," as  possessors  of  the  "New  England  con- 
science." One  of  the  effects  of  a  Puritanical  bringing- 
up  is  a  belief  that  pleasure  is  unworthy,  especially  in 
the  sex  field  and  even  in  marriage.  Now  and  then  one 
meets  a  patient  caught  between  perfectly  proper  desire 


THE  SENTIMENTS  OF  LOVE  AND  HATE  155 

and  an  obsession  that  such  pleasure  is  debasing;  and 
a  feeling  of  self-disgust  and  self-hatred  results  that  is 
the  more  tragic  since  it  is  useless. 

There  are  those  in  whom  self-love  and  self-esteem  is  at 
a  lower  pressure  than  with  the  average  man,  just  as 
there  are  those  in  whom  it  is  at  a  much  higher  pressure. 
Such  people,  when  fatigued  or  when  subject  to  the  hos- 
tile or  even  non-friendly  opinion  of  others,  become  so- 
called  self-conscious,  i.  e.,  are  afflicted  with  fear  and  a 
feeling  of  inferiority.  This  may  deepen  into  self- 
contempt  and  self-hatred.  Part  of  what  is  called  con- 
fidence in  oneself  is  self-esteem,  and  under  fatigue, 
illness,  after  punishment  of  a  physical  or  mental  na- 
ture, it  is  apt  to  disappear.  Very  distressing  is  this 
in  those  who  have  been  accustomed  to  courage  and  self- 
confidence,  perhaps  whose  occupation  makes  these 
qualities  necessary.  Soldiers,  after  gassing  or  cerebral 
concussion,  men  completely  without  introspection,  fear- 
less and  gay  with  assurance,  become  apprehensive,  self- 
analytical  and  without  the  least  faith  in  themselves,  so 
that  they  approach  their  work  in  fear.  So  with  men 
who  work  in  high  places  or  where  there  is  risk,  such  as 
steeplejacks,  bridge  builders,  iron  workers,  engineers; 
let  an  accident  happen  to  them,  or  let  there  occur  an 
exhausting  disease  with  its  aftermath  of  neurasthenia, 
and  the  self-esteem  and  self-confidence  disappear  so 
that  in  many  cases  they  have  to  give  up  their  job. 

Because  self -disgust  and  hatred  are  so  painful,  com- 
pensatory "  mechanisms  "  have  been  set  up.  There  is 
in  many  people  a  tendency  to  project  outward  the  blame 
for  those  acts  or  thoughts  which  they  dislike.  In  the 
pathological  field  we  get  those  delusions  of  influence 
that  are  so  common.  Thus  a  patient  will  attribute  his 
obscene  thoughts  and  words  to  a  hypnotic  effect  of 


156  THE  FOUNDATIONS  OF  PERSONALITY 

some  person  or  group  of  persons  and  saves  his  own  face 
by  the  delusion.  In  lesser  pathological  measure,  men 
have  fiercely  preached  against  the  snares  and  wiles  of 
women,  refusing  to  recognize  that  the  turmoil  of  unwel- 
come desire  into  which  they  were  thrown  was  internal 
in  the  greater  part  of  its  origin  and  that  the  woman 
often  knew  little  or  not  at  all  of  the  effect  she  helped 
produce.  One  of  the  outstanding  features  in  the  his- 
tory of  the  race  has  been  this  transfer  of  blame  from 
the  desire  of  men  to  the  agent  which  aroused  them.  Of 
course,  women  have  played  on  the  desires  of  men,  but 
even  where  this  was  true  the  blame  for  vulnerability 
has  seldom  been  fully  accepted.  Whenever  any  one  has 
been  "  weak  "  or  "  foolish  "  or  "  sinful  ",  his  mind  at 
once  seeks  avenues  of  escape  from  the  blame,  from  the 
painful  feeling  of  inferiority  and  self-reproach.  The 
avenue  of  escape  selected  may  be  to  blame  others  as 
tempting  or  not  warning  and  not  teaching,  may  become 
entirely  delusional,  or  it  may  take  the  religious  form  of 
confession,  expiation  and  repentance.  There  are  some 
so  hardy  in  their  self-esteem  that  they  never  suffer, 
never  seek  any  escape  from  self-reproach,  largely  be- 
cause they  never  feel  it;  and  others,  though  they  seek 
escape,  are  continually  dragged  by  conscience  to  self- 
imposed  torture.  Most  of  us  seek  explanations  for  our 
unwelcome  conduct  on  a  plane  most  favorable  to  our 
self-esteem,  and  there  arises  an  elaborate  system  of 
self-disguise,  expiation,  repentance  and  confession  that 
is  in  a  large  part  the  real  inner  life  of  the  majority.  To 
explain  failure  especially  are  the  avenues  of  escape  uti- 
lized. Wounded  in  his  self-esteem,  rare  is  the  one  who 
frankly  acknowledges  inferiority.  "  Pull,"  "  favorit- 
ism," "luck,"  explain  the  success  of  others  as  do  the 
reverse  circumstances  explain  our  failures  to  ourselves. 


THE  SENTIMENTS  OF  LOVE  AND  HATE  157 

Sickness  explains  it,  and  so  the  defeated  search  in  them- 
selves for  the  explanation  which  will  in  part  compensate 
them.  Escape  from  inferiority  follows  many  avenues, 
—  by  actual  development  of  superiority,  by  denying 
real  superiority  to  others,  or  by  explaining  the  infe- 
riority on  some  acceptable  basis. 

Here  (as  elsewhere  in  character)  there  is  evident  an 
organic  and  a  social  basis  for  feeling.  We  have  not 
emphasized  sufficiently  a  peculiarity  of  all  human  feel- 
ing, all  emotions,  all  sentiments.  They  have  their  value 
to  the  individual  in  organizing  his  conduct,  his  stand- 
ard of  value.  They  are  of  enormous  importance  so- 
cially. A  great  law  of  feeling  of  whatever  kind,  of 
whatever  elaboration,  is  this;  it  tends  to  spread  from 
individual  to  individual  and  excites  whole  groups  to  the 
same  feeling;  tender  feeling  is  contagious,  and  so  is 
hate.  We  are  somehow  so  made  that  we  reverberate  at 
a  friendly  smile  in  one  way  and  to  the  snarl  and  stern 
look  of  hate  in  another  way.  Ordinarily  love  awakens 
love  and  hate  awakens  hate,  though  it  may  bring  fear  or 
contempt.  It  is  true  that  we  may  feel  so  superior  or 
cherish  some  secret  hate  that  will  make  another's  love 
odious  to  us,  and  also  we  may  admire  and  worship  one 
who  hates  us.  These  are  exceptional  cases  and  are  ex- 
amples of  exceptional  sentimental  stability.  It  is  of 
course  understood  that  by  love  is  not  meant  sex  pas- 
sion. Here  the  curious  effect  of  coldness  is  sometimes 
to  fan  the  flame  of  passion.  Desire  obstructed  often 
gains  in  violence,  and  the  desire  to  conquer  and  to  pos- 
sess the  proud,  that  we  all  feel,  adds  to  the  fire  of  lust. 

Self-esteem,  self-confidence,  hateful  to  others  if  in  ex- 
cess or  if  obtrusive,  is  an  essential  of  the  leader.  His 
feeling  is  extraordinarily  contagious,  and  the  morale  of 
the  group  is  in  his  keeping.  He  must  not  show  fear,  or 


158   THE  FOUNDATIONS  OF  PERSONALITY 

self-distrust  or  self-lowering  in  any  way.  He  must  be 
deliberate,  but  forceful,  vigorous,  masterful.  If  he  has 
doubts,  he  must  keep  them  to  himself  or  exhibit  them 
only  to  one  who  loves  him,  who  is  not  a  mere  follower. 
It  is  a  law  of  life  that  the  herd  follows  the  unwounded, 
confident,  egoistic  leader  and  tears  to  pieces  or  deserts 
the  one  who  is  wearying. 

The  basic  sentiments  of  interest,  love  and  hate,  pro- 
jected outward  or  inward,  organize  personality.  Men's 
characters  and  their  destinies  rest  in  the  things  they 
find  interesting,  the  persons  they  love  and  hate,  their 
self-confidence  and  self-esteem,  their  self-contempt  and 
hatred.  And  it  is  true  that  often  we  hate  and  love  the 
same  person  or  circumstance;  we  are  divided,  secretly, 
in  our  tenderest  feelings,  in  our  fiercest  hate,  more 
often,  alas,  in  the  former.  For  occasionally  admiration 
and  respect  will  mitigate  hate  and  render  impotent  our 
aim,  but  more  commonly  we  are  jealous  of  or  envy  son, 
brother,  sister,  husband,  wife,  father,  mother  and  friend. 
We  love  our  work  but  hate  its  tyranny,  and  even  the 
ideal  that  we  cherish,  when  we  examine  it  too  closely, 
seems  overconventionalized,  not  enough  our  own,  and  it 
stifles  and  martyrs  too  many  unpleasant  desires.  We 
rebel  against  our  own  affections,  against  the  love  that 
chains  us  perhaps  to  weakness  and  forces  us,  weary,  to 
the  wheel. 

How  deeply  the  feeling  of  "  right "  enters  into  the  sen- 
timents and  their  labors  needs  only  a  little  reflection 
to  understand.  Here  we  come  to  the  effect  of  the  sen- 
timent of  duty,  for  as  such  it  may  be  discussed.  The 
establishment  of  conscience  as  our  inner  guide  to  con- 
duct, and  even  to  thought  and  emotions,  has  been  studied 
briefly.  On  a  basis  of  innate  capacity,  conscience  arises 
from   the  teaching  and  traditions  of  the  group    (or 


THE  SENTIMENTS  OF  LOVE  AND  HATE  159 

groups).  The  individual  who  has  a  susceptibility  or 
a  readiness  to  believe  and  a  desire  to  be  in  conformity 
accepts  or  evolves  for  himself  principles  of  conduct, 
based  on  obligation,  expectation  of  reward  and  fear  of 
punishment,  these  entering  in  various  proportions,  ac- 
cording to  the  type  of  person.  In  children,  or  the  very 
young  child,  expectation  of  reward  and  fear  of  punish- 
ment are  more  important  than  obligation,  and  this  re- 
mains true  of  many  people  throughout  life.  Gradually 
right,  what  we  call  duty,  becomes  established  as  a  guid- 
ing principle ;  but  it  must  struggle  with  impulse  and  the 
desire  for  immediate  pleasure  throughout  life.  In 
fact,  one  of  the  dangers  of  the  development  of  the  feel- 
ing of  duty  lies  in  the  view  often  held  by  those  guided 
by  principle  and  duty  that  pleasure  is  in  itself  some- 
how wrong  and  needs  justification.  Whereas,  in  my 
opinion,  pleasure  is  right  and  needs  no  justification  and 
is  wrong  only  when  it  offends  the  fundamental  morali- 
ties and  purposes  of  Society. 

The  feeling  of  "  right "  depends  to  a  certain  extent 
on  the  kind  of  teaching  in  early  childhood,  but  more 
on  the  nature  of  the  individual.  It  is  based  on  his 
social  feeling,  his  desire  to  be  in  harmony  with  a  group 
or  a  God  that  essentially  stands  above  any  group.  For 
the  idea  of  God  introduces  an  element  having  more  au- 
thority than  the  group  whom  He  leads.  Here  also  is 
a  factor  of  importance :  choice  is  difficult  for  the  great 
majority.  Placed  in  a  situation  where  more  than  one 
response  is  possible,  an  unhappy  state  of  bewilderment 
results  unless  there  are  formulae  for  action.  The  leader 
is  the  chooser  for  the  group ;  religion  is  an  established 
system  of  choices  even  in  its  "  Thou  shalt  not "  injunc- 
tions, and  to  be  at  one  with  God  implies  that  one  is  fol- 
lowing an  infallible  leader,  and  doubt  and  uncertainty 


160  THE  FOUNDATIONS  OF  PERSONALITY 

disappear.  Trotter^  points  out  clearly  the  rdle  the 
feeling  of  certitude  plays  in  developing  codes.  As  life 
becomes  more  complex,  as  more  choices  appear,  the  need 
of  an  established  method  of  choosing  becomes  greater. 
The  careful,  cautious,  conscientious  types  develop  a  sys- 
tem of  principles  for  choice  of  action ;  they  discard  the 
uncertainty  of  pleasure  as  a  guide  for  the  certainty  of 
a  code  laid  down  and  fixed.  Duty  is  the  north  star  of 
conduct ! 

In  passing,  an  interesting  development  of  our  times 
is  worth  noticing.  The  tendency  is  to  discard  estab- 
lished codes,  to  weaken  dogma  and  to  throw  more  re- 
sponsibility on  the  individual  conscience.  That  is  the 
meaning  of  the  Protestant  reformation,  and  it  is  the 
meaning  of  the  growth  of  Unitarianism  within  the  Prot- 
estant church;  it  is  also  the  meaning  of  the  reform 
movement  in  Judaism.  The  Catholic  church  has  felt  it 
in  the  breaking  away  of  state  after  state  from  its  author- 
ity, which  virtually  means  that  the  states  have  thrown 
their  citizens  back  on  their  own  consciences  and  the  state 
laws.  In  fact,  reliance  on  law  is  in  part  an  effort  to 
escape  the  necessity  of  choosing.  The  pressure  of  ex- 
ternal authority  has  its  burden,  but  in  giving  up  its  cer- 
tainty man  also  gives  up  tranquillity.  Much  of  modern 
neurasthenia  is  characterized  by  a  feeling  of  uncertainty, 
unreality,  doubt:  what  is  right,  what  is  real?  True,  as 
religion  in  the  dogmatic  sense  relinquishes  its  power, 
ethics  grow  in  value  and  men  seek  some  other  formula 
which  will  compensate  for  the  dogma.  It  is  no  acci- 
dent that  as  the  old  religions  lose  their  complete  control 
new  ones  appear,  with  all-embracing  formula,  like 
Christian  Science,  New  Thought,  etc.  Though  these 
start  with  elastic  general  principles,  sooner  or  later  the 

*  "  The  Herd  and  its  Instincts  in  Peace  and  War." 


THE  SENTIMENTS  OF  LOVE  AND  HATE   161 

directions  for  conduct  become  minute  and  then  fixed. 
The  tragedy  of  a  great  founder  of  religion  like  Buddha 
or  Christ  is  that  though  he  gives  out  a  great  pure  prin- 
ciple, his  followers  must  have,  demand  and  evolve  a  dog- 
matic religion  with  fixed  ceremonials.  Man,  on  the 
whole,  does  not  want  to  choose;  he  wants  to  have  the 
feeling  that  he  ought  to  do  this  or  that  according  to  a 
code  laid  down  by  authority.  This  will  make  a  real 
democracy  always  impossible. 

However  the  sentiment  of  duty  arises,  it  becomes  the 
central  feeling  in  all  inner  conflicts,  and  it  wrestles 
with  inclination  and  the  pleasant  choice.  Duty  is  the 
great  inhibitor,  but  also  it  says  "  Thou  shalt !  "  Ideally, 
duty  involves  self-sacrifice,  and  practically  man  dislikes 
self-sacrifice  save  where  love  is  very  strong.  Duty 
chains  a  man  to  his  task  where  he  is  inclined  for  a  hol- 
iday. Duty  may  demand  a  man's  life,  and  that  sacrifice 
seems  easier  for  men  to  make  than  the  giving  up  of 
power  and  pelf.  ( In  the  late  war  it  was  no  great  trou- 
ble to  pass  laws  conscripting  life ;  it  was  impossible  to 
pass  laws  conscripting  wealth.  It  was  easier  for  a  man 
to  allow  his  son  to  go  to  war  than  to  give  up  his  wealth 
en  masse.) 

The  power  of  the  feeling  of  duty  and  right  over  men 
is  very  variable.  There  are  a  few  to  whom  the  feeling 
of  "  ought  "  is  all  powerful ;  they  cannot  struggle  against 
it,  even  though  they  wish  to.  All  of  their  goings,  com- 
ings and  doings  are  governed  thereby,  and  even  though 
they  find  the  rest  of  the  world  dropping  from  them,  they 
resist  the  herd.  For  the  mass  of  men  duty  governs  a 
few  relationships  —  to  family  and  country  —  and  even 
here  self-interest  is  camouflaged  by  the  term  "  duty  " 
in  the  phrase  "  a  man  owes  a  duty  to  himself."  This  is 
the  end  of  real  duty.     The  average  man  or  woman 


162  THE  FOUNDATIONS  OF  PERSONALITY 

makes  a  duty  of  nonessentials,  of  ceremonials,  but  is 
greatly  moved  by  the  cry  of  duty  if  it  comes  from  au- 
thority or  from  those  he  respects.  He  fiercely  resents 
it  if  told  he  is  not  doing  his  duty,  but  is  quick  to  tell 
others  they  are  not  doing  theirs. 

There  is  also  a  group  in  whom  the  sense  of  duty  is 
almost  completely  lacking,  or  rather  fails  to  govern 
action.  Ordinarily  these  are  spoken  of  as  lacking  moral 
fiber,  but  in  reality  the  organizing  energy  of  character 
and  the  inhibition  of  the  impulse  to  seek  pleasure  and 
present  desire  is  feeble.  Sometimes  there  is  lack  of  af- 
fection toward  others,  little  of  the  real  glow  of  tender 
feeling,  either  towards  children  ^  or  parents  or  any  one. 
Though  these  are  often  emotional,  they  are  not,  in  the 
good  meaning  of  the  term,  sentimental. 

Is  the  sentiment  of  duty  waning?  The  alarmists 
say  it  is  and  point  to  the  increase  of  divorce,  falling  off 
in  church  attendance,  and  the  unrest  among  the  labor- 
ing classes  as  evidence  that  there  is  a  decadence.  Pleas- 
ure is  sought,  excitement  is  the  goal,  and  sober,  solid 
duty  is  "  forgotten."  They  point  out  a  resemblance  to 
the  decadent  days  of  Rome,  in  the  rise  of  luxury  and  lux- 
urious tastes,  and  indicate  that  duty  and  the  love  of 
luxury  cannot  coexist.  Woman  has  forgotten  her  duty 
to  bear  children  and  to  maintain  the  home  and  man  has 
forgotten  his  duty  to  God. 

Superficially  these  critics  are  right.  There  is  a  de- 
mand for  a  more  satisfying  life,  involving  less  self- 
sacrifice  on  the  part  of  those  who  have  in  the  past  made 
the  bulk  of  the  sacrifices.  Woman,  demanding  equality, 
refuses  to  be  regarded  as  merely  a  child  bearer  and  is 

*It  is  again  to  be  emphasized  that  the  most  vital  instincts  may 
be  lacking.  Even  the  maternal  feeling  may  be  absent,  not  only  in  the 
human  mother  but  in  the  animal  mother.  So  we  need  not  be  surprised 
if  there  are  those  with  no  sense  of  right  or  duty. 


THE  SENTIMENTS  OF  LOVE  AND  HATE  163 

become  a  seeker  of  luxury.  The  working  man,  look- 
ing at  the  world  he  has  built,  now  able  to  read,  write 
and  vote,  asks  why  the  duty  is  all  on  his  side.  In  other 
words,  a  demand  for  justice,  which  is  merely  reciprocal, 
universal  duty,  has  weakened  something  of  the  sense 
of  duty.  In  fact,  that  is  the  first  effect  of  the  feeling 
of  injustice,  of  unjust  inequality.  Dealing  with  the 
emancipated,  the  old  conception  of  duty  as  loyalty  un- 
der all  conditions  has  not  worked,  and  we  need  new 
ideals  of  duty  on  the  part  of  governments  and  governing 
groups  before  we  can  get  the  proper  ideals  of  duty  in 
the  governed. 

Some  of  those  ideals  are  commencing  to  be  heard. 
International  duty  for  governments  is  talked  of  and 
some  are  bold  to  say  that  national  feeling  prevents  a 
real  feeling  of  duty  to  the  world,  to  man.  These  claim 
that  duty  must  have  its  origin  in  the  extension  of  tender 
feeling,  in  fraternity,  to  all  men.  In  a  lesser  way  busi- 
ness is  commencing  to  substitute  for  its  former  motto, 
^^  Handelschaft  ist  keine  Bruderschaff  (business  is  no 
brotherhood),  the  ideal  of  service,  as  the  duty  of  busi- 
ness. Everywhere  we  are  commencing  to  hear  of  "  so- 
cial duty,"  of  obligation  to  the  lesser  and  unfortunate, 
of  the  responsibility  of  the  leaders  to  the  led,  of  the 
well  to  the  sick,  of  the  law-abiding  to  the  criminal. 
Strange  notion,  this  last,  but  one  at  bottom  sound  and 
practical. 

In  the  end,  the  true  sense  of  duty  is  in  a  sense  of  in- 
(iividual  responsibility.  Our  age  feels  this  as  no  other 
age  has  felt  it.  Other  ages  have  placed  responsibility 
on  the  Church,  on  God  and  on  the  State.  Difficult 
and  onerous  as  is  the  burden,  we  are  commencing  to 
place  duty  on  the  individual,  and  in  that  respect  we  are 
not  in  the  least  a  decadent  generation. 


CHAPTER  IX 

ENERGY  RELEASE  AND  THE  EMOTIONS 

One  of  the  problems  in  all  work  is  to  place  things  in 
their  right  order,  in  the  order  of  origin  and  importance. 
This  difficulty  is  almost  insoluble  when  one  studies  the 
character  of  man.  As  we  see  him  in  operation,  the 
synthesis  is  so  complete  that  we  can  hardly  discern  the 
component  parts.  Inheritance,  social  pressure,  excite- 
ment, interest,  love,  hate,  self-interest,  duty  and  obliga- 
tion, —  these  are  not  unitary  in  the  least  and  there  is 
constantly  a  false  dissection  to  be  made,  an  artefact, 
in  order  that  clearness  in  presentation  may  be  obtained. 

We  see  men  as  discharging  energy  in  work  and  play, 
in  the  activities  that  help  or  hurt  themselves  and  the 
race.  They  obtain  that  energy  from  the  world  with- 
out, from  the  sunshine,  the  air,  the  plants  and  the  ani- 
mals; it  is  built  up  in  their  bodies,  it  is  discharged 
either  because  some  inner  tension  builds  up  a  desire 
or  because  some  outer  stimulus,  environmental  or  social, 
directs  it.  Though  we  have  no  way  of  measuring  one 
man's  energy  against  another's,  we  say,  perhaps  erro- 
neously, "  He  is  very  energetic,"  or  "  He  is  not "  ;  "  He 
is  tireless,"  or  "  He  breaks  down  easily."  As  students 
of  character,  we  must  take  this  question  of  the  energies 
of  men  into  account  as  integral  in  our  study. 

Granting  that  the  human  being  takes  in  energy  as 
food  and  drink  and  builds  it  up  into  dischargeable  tis- 
tues,  we  are  not  further  concerned  with  the  details  of 
its  physiology.     How  does  the  feeling  of  energy  arise. 


ENERGY  RELEASE  AND  THE  EMOTIONS  165 

what  increases  the  energy  discharge  and  what  blocks, 
inhibits  or  lowers  it?  For  from  day  to  day,  from  hour 
to  hour,  we  are  conscious  either  of  a  desire  to  be  active, 
a  feeling  of  capacity  or  the  reverse.  We  depend  on 
that  feeling  of  capacity  to  guide  us,  and  though  it  is 
organic,  it  has  its  mysterious  disappearances  and  mar- 
velous reenforcements. 

It  arises,  so  we  assume,  from  the  visceral-neuronic 
activities,  subconsciously,  in  the  sense  we  have  used 
that  word.  It  therefore  fluctuates  with  health,  with 
fatigue,  with  the  years.  We  marvel  at  the  energy  of 
childhood  and  youth,  and  the  deepest  sadness  we  have  is 
the  depletion  of  energy-feeling  in  old  age.  We  love 
energy  in  ourselves  and  we  yield  admiration,  willing  or 
unwilling,  to  its  display  in  others.  The  Hero,  the 
leader,  is  always  energetic.  In  our  times,  in  America, 
we  demand  "  pep,"  action  and  energy-display  as  an  es- 
sential in  our  play  and  in  our  work,  and  we  worship 
quite  too  frankly  where  all  men  have  always  worshiped. 

What  besides  the  organic  activity,  besides  health  and 
well-being,  excites  the  feeling  of  energy  and  what  de- 
presses it? 

1.  This  feeling  is  excited  by  the  society  of  others, 
by  the  herd-feeling,  and  depressed  by  long-continued 
solitude  or  loneliness.  The  stimuli  that  come  from 
other  people's  faces,  voices,  contacts  —  their  emotions, 
feelings  and  manifestations  of  energy  —  are  those  we 
are  best  adapted  to  react  to,  those  most  valuable  in 
stirring  us  up.  Scenery,  the  grandeur  of  the  outer 
world,  finally  depress  the  most  of  us,  and  we  can  bear 
these  things  best  in  company.  Who  has  not,  on  a  long 
railroad  journey,  watched  with  weariness  and  flickering 
interest  valley  and  hill  and  meadow  swing  by  and  then 
sat  up  with  energy  and  definite  attention  as  a  human  be- 


166  THE  FOUNDATIONS  OF  PERSONALITY 

ing  passed  along  on  some  rural  road?  Lacking  these 
stimuli  there  is  monotony  and  monotony  always  has 
with  it  as  one  of  its  painful  features  a  subjective  sense 
of  lowered  energy,  of  fatigue.  This  is  the  problem  of 
the  housewife  and  the  solitary  worker  everywhere, — 
there  is  failure  of  the  sense  of  energy  due  to  a  failure 
to  receive  new  stimuli  in  their  most  potent  form,  our 
fellows. 

2.  The  disappearance  or  injury  of  desire  and  pur- 
pose. Let  there  be  a  sudden  blocking  of  a  purpose  or 
an  aim,  so  that  it  seems  impossible  of  fulfillment,  and 
energy-feeling  drops;  movement,  thought,  even  feeling 
seem  painful.  The  will  flags,  and  the  whole  world  be- 
comes unreal.  This  is  part  of  the  anhedonia  we  spokfe 
of. 

In  reality,  we  have  the  disappearance  of  hope  as  basic 
in  this  adynamia.  Hope  and  courage  are  in  part  organic, 
in  part  are  due  to  the  belief  that  a  desired  goal  can 
be  reached.  Whether  that  goal  is  health,  when  one  is 
sick,  or  riches,  or  fame,  or  love  and  possession,  if  it  is 
a  well-centralized  goal  toward  which  our  main  energies 
are  bent,  and  then  seems  suddenly  impossible  to  reach, 
there  is  a  corresponding  paralysis  of  energy. 

Here  is  where  a  great  difference  is  seen  between  in- 
dividuals and  between  one  time  of  life  and  another.  There 
are  some  to  whom  hope  is  a  shining  beacon  light  never 
absent ;  whatever  happens,  hope  remains,  like  the  beau- 
tiful fable  of  Pandora's  box.  There  are  others  to  whom 
any  obstruction,  any  discouraging  feature,  blots  out 
hope,  and  who  constantly  need  the  energy  of  others; 
their  persuasions  and  exhortations,  for  a  renewal  of 
energy.  Here,  as  elsewhere  in  life,  some  are  givers 
and  others  takers  of  energy.  In  the  presence  of  the 
hopeless  it  is  hard  to  maintain  one's  own  feeling  of 


ENERGY  RELEASE  AND  THE  EMOTIONS  167 

energy  and  that  is  why  the  average  man  shuns  them. 
He  guards  as  priceless  his  own  enthusiasm. 

Curiously  enough,  when  energy  tends  to  disappear 
in  the  face  of  disaster  to  one's  plans,  a  tonic  is  often 
enough  the  reflection,  "  it  might  have  been  worse  "  or 
"  there  are  others  worse  off."  ^  Though  one  rebels 
against  the  encouraging  effect  of  the  last  statement,  it 
does  console,  it  does  renew  hope.  For  hope  and  energy 
and  desire  are  competitive,  as  is  every  other  measure 
of  value.  So  long  as  one  is  not  the  worst  off,  then 
there  is  something  left,  there  is  a  hopeful  element  in  the 
situation.  Similarly  a  certain  rough  treatment  helps, 
as  when  Job  is  told  practically,  "  After  all,  who  is  Man 
that  he  should  ask  for  the  fulfillment  of  his  hopes?  " 
A  sense  of  littleness  with  the  rest  of  the  race  acts  to 
bring  resignation,  and  after  that  has  been  established, 
hope  can  reappear.  For  resignation  is  rarely  a  pro- 
longed state  of  mind;  it  is  a  doorway  through  which 
we  reenter  into  the  vista-chambers  of  Hope. 

And  one  clearly  sees  the  benefit  of  a  belief,  a  faith 
in  God.  "  Gott  in  sein  Mizpah  ist  gerecht"  cries  the 
orthodox  Jew  when  his  hope  is  shattered,  — "  God's 
decree  is  just."  This  is  Hope  Eternal ;  "  my  purposes 
are  blocked,  but  were  they  God's  purposes?  No.  He 
would  not  then  block  them.  I  must  seek  God's  pur- 
poses." Faith  is  really  a  transcendent  Hope,  renewing 
the  feeling  of  energy. 

3.  The  belief  that  one  has  the  good  opinion  of  others 
is  a  powerful  stimulus  to  energy  and  feeling.  We  have 
already  considered  the  effect  of  praise  and  blame.  Some 
are  so  constituted  that  they  need  the  approval  of  others 
at  all  times;  they  are  at  the  mercy  of  any  one  who 

*  A  humorous  use  of  this  fact  is  in  the  popular  "  Cheer  up,  the  worst 
is  yet  to  come!  "     This  acts  as  a  rough  tonic 


168  THE  FOUNDATIONS  OF  PERSONALITY 

gives  them  a  cold  look  or  a  harsh  word.  Others  cling 
to  the  need  of  their  own  self -approval ;  they  are  aristo- 
crats, firm  and  secure  in  their  self-estimate.  Let  their 
self-esteem  crumble,  and  these  proud  and  haughty  ones 
are  humble,  weak,  inefficient.  We  fiercely  resent  crit- 
icism because  in  it  is  a  threat  to  our  source  of  energy, 
our  very  feeling  of  being  alive. 

One  has  shrewdly  to  examine  his  fellow  men  from  this 
angle :  "Does  he  work  up  his  own  steam ;  are  his  boilers 
of  energy  heated  by  his  own  enthusiasm  and  his  own 
self -approval?  Or  does  he  borrow;  can  he  work  only  if 
others  add  their  fire  to  his;  does  his  light  go  out  if 
his  neighbors  turn  away  or  are  too  busy  to  help  him?  " 
One  type  of  man  may  be  as  admirable  as  another  in  his 
gifts,  but  the  types  need  different  treatment. 

Self-valuation  is  to  a  large  extent  our  opinion  of 
the  valuation  of  others  of  ourselves.^  We  believe  peo- 
ple like  us,  think  we  are  fine  and  able,  or  beautiful,  and 
we  react  with  energy  to  difficulties.  We  may  be  wrong ; 
they  may  call  us  a  conceited  ass  and  laugh  at  us  behind 
our  backs,  but  so  long  as  we  do  not  find  it  out,  it  doesn't 
matter.  There  is,  however,  no  blow  quite  so  severe 
as  the  sudden  realization  that  we  have  mistaken  the 
opinion  of  others,  we  have  been  "  fooled."  To  be  fooled 
is  to  be  lowered  in  one's  own  self-esteem,  and  we  like 
sincerity  and  hate  insincerity  largely  because  our  self- 
esteem  stands  on  some  solid  basis  in  the  one  case  and 
on  none  whatever  in  the  other.  Most  of  us  would 
rather  have  people  say  bad  things  of  us  to  our  face 
than  run  the  risk  of  the  ridicule  and  the  foolish  feeling 
that  comes  with  insincerity.  There  are  some  who  are 
always  suspicious  that  people  are  insincere  in  praise 

^  To  paraphrase  Doctor  Holmes,  the  biggest  factor  in  John's  self- 
valuation  is  Ms  idea  of  Jane's  idea  of  John. 


ENERGY  RELEASE  AND  THE  EMOTIONS  169 

or  friendly  words;  they  hate  being  fooled,  they  know 
of  no  criterion  of  sincerity  and  such  people  are  in  an 
adynamic  state  most  of  the  time.  The  difference  be- 
tween the  trusting  and  the  suspicious  is  that  one  re- 
sponds with  energy  and  belief  to  the  manifestations  of 
friendliness  in  everybody,  and  the  other  has  no  such 
inner  response  to  guide  his  energy  and  his  actions. 
Trust  in  others  is  a  releaser  of  energy;  distrust  para- 
lyzes it. 

4.  Doubt  and  inability  to  choose  may  be  contrasted 
with  certitude  and  clear  choice  in  their  effect  on  energy 
release.  Of  course,  one  of  the  signs  of  lowered  energy 
is  doubt,  as  a  sign  of  high  energy  is  certainty.  Never- 
theless, a  situation  of  critical  importance,  in  which 
choice  is  difflcult  or  disagreeable,  inhibits  energy  feel- 
ing ^  and  discharge  perhaps  as  much  as  any  other  mental 
factor.  Especially  is  this  true  when  the  inhibition 
concerns  a  moral  situation  —  "  Ought  I  to  do  this  or 
that "  —  and  where  the  fear  of  being  wrong  or  doing 
wrong  operates  so  that  the  individual  does  nothing  and 
develops  an  obsession  of  doubt.  This  "  to  be  or  not  to 
be  "  attitude  is  typical  of  many  intelligent  people,  yes, 
even  intellectual  people.  They  see  so  many  angles  to 
a  situation,  they  project  so  far  into  the  future  in  their 
thoughts,  that  a  weary  discouragement  comes.  To  such 
as  these,  the  counsel  of  "action  right  or  wrong  but 
action  anyway ! "  is  good,  but  the  difficulty  is  to  make 
them  overcome  their  doubts.  Their  cerebral  oscillation 
makes  them  weary  but  they  cannot  seem  to  stop  it; 
their  pendulum  of  choice  never  stops  at  action. 

If  one  wishes  to  destroy  the  energy  of  any  one,  the 
best  way  to  do  it  is  to  sow  the  seeds  of  doubt.     "  Your 

*  See  William  James '  "  Varieties  of  Religious  Experiences,"  for  beau- 
tiful examples.  The  Russian  writers  are  often  narrators  of  this 
struggle. 


170  THE  FOUNDATIONS  OF  PERSONALITY 

ideal  is  a  fine  one,  my  friend,  but  —  isn't  it  a  little 
sophomoric? "  "A  nice  piece  of  work,  but  —  who 
wants  it?  "  On  the  other  hand,  to  one  obsessed  by 
doubt  it  may  happen  that  a  whole-hearted  endorsement, 
a  resolution  of  the  doubt,  brings  with  it  first  relief  and 
then  a  swing  of  energy  into  the  channels  of  action. 

5.  Competition  is  a  great  factor  in  energy  release. 
Every  one  has  seen  a  horse  ambling  along,  apparently 
without  sufficient  energy  to  go  more  than  four  miles 
an  hour.  Suddenly  he  cocks  up  his  ears  as  the  sounds 
of  the  hoof  beats  of  a  rapidly  traveling  horse  are  heard. 
He  shakes  his  head  and  to  the  amazement  or  amusement 
of  his  driver  sets  off  in  rivalry  at  a  two-minute  clip. 
Intensely  cooperative  and  gregarious  as  man  is,  he  is 
as  intensely  competitive,  spurred  on  by  his  observa- 
tions of  the  other  fellow.  Introduce  a  definite  system 
of  rivalry  into  a  school  or  an  office,  and  you  release 
energies  never  manifested  before.  There  are  some  to 
whom  this  is  the  main  releaser  of  energy;  struggle, 
competition  and  victory  over  another  is  their  stimulus. 
They  can  play  no  game  unless  there  is  competition,  and 
the  solitary  pleasures  and  satisfactions,  like  reading, 
exploring,  a  row  on  the  river  or  a  walk  in  the  woods, 
cannot  arouse  them.  Others  dislike  rivalry  or  com- 
petition; they  are  too  sympathetic  to  wish  victory  over 
another  and  also  they  dread  to  lose.  They  prefer  team 
play  and  cooperation.  The  world  will  always  seem  dif- 
ferent to  these  two  types.  This  may  be  said  now  that 
for  most  of  us,  who  are  somewhat  of  a  blend  in  this  mat- 
ter, rivalry  is  pleasant  and  stimulating  when  there  is 
a  show  of  success,  but  we  prefer  cooperation  when  we 
foresee  failure. 

This  brings  up  the  interesting  phase  of  precedent  in 
energy  release.    Early  success,  unless  it  brin^  too  hi^h 


ENERGY  RELEASE  AND  THE  EMOTIONS  171 

a  self-valuation,  which  is  its  great  danger,  is  remark- 
ably valuable  in  releasing  energy,  and  failure  establishes 
a  precedent  that  may  bring  doubt,  fear  and  the  attend- 
ant inhibition  of  energy.  Of  course,  failure  may  bring 
with  it  caution  and  a  recasting  of  plans  and  thus  con- 
stitute the  most  valuable  of  experiences.  But  if  it  is 
too  great,  or  if  there  is  lacking  a  certain  fortitude,  it 
may  act  as  a  paralyzer  of  energy  thenceforth.  In  the 
prize  ring  this  is  often  noted ;  the  spirit  of  a  man  goes 
with  a  defeat  and  he  never  again  has  self-confidence; 
thereafter  his  energy  is  constantly  inhibited. 

Emotions  have  long  been  studied  in  their  effects  on 
energy.  In  fact,  every  animal  that  bristles  and  snarls 
as  it  faces  a  foe  is,  unconsciously,  attempting  to  para- 
lyze with  fear  its  opponent,  to  render  it  helpless  through 
the  inhibition  of  action.  So  with  the  lurking  tiger;  it 
waits  in  silence  for  the  prey  and  seeks  the  fascination 
of  surprise  as  a  factor  in  victory.  On  the  other  hand, 
the  emotion  of  fear  may  be  a  releaser  of  energy  for  the 
prospective  victim ;  it  may  release  the  energies  of  flight 
and  add  to  the  power  of  the  animal.  In  this,  there  is 
a  unique  and  neglected  phase  of  emotion,  i.e.,  if  you 
shake  your  fist  at  your  enemy  and  he  runs  away  or 
knocks  you  down,  then  your  manifestation  of  anger  has 
been  unsuccessful  for  you  but  his  reaction  has  been  suc- 
cessful for  him.  If  he  becomes  so  paralyzed  with  fear 
that  you  can  work  your  will  with  him,  then  your  anger 
is  successful  while  his  fear  is  not.  Most  of  the  psycholo- 
gists have  neglected  this  phase  of  emotion.  Thus  it  is 
hard  to  understand  the  use  fainting  from  terror  has 
to  the  victim.  The  answer  is  it  is  useful  to  him  who 
has  caused  the  victim  to  faint. 

6.  For  the  individual,  the  emotion  of  fear  has  as  its 
function  a  preparation  for  a  danger  that  is  foreseen  to 


172  THE  FOUNDATIONS  OF  PJERSONALITY 

be  too  powerful  to  be  met  with  effective  resistance.  Fear 
says,  "  It's  no  use  to  fight,  fly  or  hide."  Therefore,  nor- 
mally there  is  a  heightening  of  energy  feeling  and  action 
in  these  two  directions.  There  are  plenty  of  recorded 
incidents  where  fear  has  enabled  men  to  run  distances 
utterly  impossible  to  them  otherwise.  In  the  fear  states 
of  mental  disease,  the  resistance  a  frail  woman  will  offer 
to  her  attendants  is  such  that  the  utmost  strength  of 
several  people  is  required  to  restrain  her.  Under  these 
circumstances  fear  acts  as  an  energizer,  causing  physi- 
cal reactions  not  ordinarily  within  the  will  of  the  per- 
son. "  Fear  lends  wings,"  is  the  time-honored  way  of 
expressing  this.  The  trapped  animal  makes  "  frantic  " 
efforts  to  escape. 

Fear  is  extraordinarily  contagious,  perhaps  because 
as  herd  members  the  cry  of  fear  sets  us  all  racing  for 
safety.  This  is  the  grimmest  danger  from  fires  in  public 
places  or  the  presence  of  a  coward  in  a  military  unit. 
Panic  occurs  with  its  blind  unreasoning  flight,  and  the 
result  is  disastrous.  I  emphasize  again  that  emotions 
are  poorly  adapted  to  the  welfare  of  the  individual. 
Business  panics  are  in  large  measure  the  result  of  the 
contagiousness  of  fear;  timidity  spreads  like  wildfire, 
distrust  and  suspicion  are  aroused  and  stagnation  re- 
sults without  a  "  real  "  basis.  In  President  Wilson's 
phrase,  the  panic  is  "  purely  psychological." 

Intellectualized,  fear  becomes  one  of  the  driving  forces 
of  life,  as  Hobbes  ^  pointed  out.  Fear  of  punishment 
undoubtedly  deters  from  crime,  though  it  is  not  in  itself 
Buflficient,  and  the  kind  of  punishment  becomes  impor- 
tant. Fear  of  hunger  has  brought  prudence,  caution, 
agriculture  into  the  world.  Life  insurance  has  its  root 
in  fear  for  others,  who  are  really  part  of  one's  self ;  the 

^  Hobbes  made  fear  the  most  important  motive  in  the  conduct  of  man. 


ENERGY  RELEASE  AND  THE  EMOTIONS  173 

fear  of  the  rainy  day  is  back  of  most  of  the  thrift,  though 
the  acquisitive  feeling  and  duty  may  also  operate  pow- 
erfully. Fear  of  venereal  disease  impels  many  a  man 
to  continence  who  otherwise  would  follow  his  desire. 
And  fear  of  the  bad  opinion  of  others  is  the  most  pow- 
erful deterrent  force  in  the  world.  "  What  will  people 
say  "  is,  at  bottom,  fear  that  they  will  say  bad  things, 
and  though  it  keeps  men  from  the  "  bad  "  conduct,  it 
inhibits  the  finer,  nobler  actions  as  well.  There  is  a 
great  deal  of  unconventional  untrammeled  belief  in  the 
world  that  never  finds  expression  because  of  fear. 

How  deeply  the  fear  of  death  modifies  the  life  of 
people  it  is  impossible  to  state.  To  every  one  there 
comes  the  awful  reflection  that  he,  that  warmly  pulsat- 
ing being,  in  love  with  the  world  and  with  living,  "  center 
of  the  universe,"  he  himself  must  die,  must  be  cold  and 
still  and  have  no  will,  no  power,  no  feeling;  be  buried 
in  the  ground.  Most  of  the  essential  melancholy  of  the 
world  is  due  to  this  realization,  and  most  of  the  feeling 
of  pessimism  and  futility  thus  has  its  origin.  Mortal 
man  —  a  worm  of  the  earth  —  a  brief  flower  doomed  to 
perish  —  and  all  of  it  finds  final  expression  in  Gray's 
marvelous  words : 

"The  toast  of  heraldry,  the  pomp  of  pow'r. 

And  all  that  beauty,  all  that  wealth  e'er  gave. 
Await  alike  the  irtevitable  hour. 

The  paths  of  glory  lead  hut  to  the  grave." 

"Why  strive,  thou  poor  creature,  for  wealth  and 
power;  sink  thyself  in  the  Godhead!"  "Turn,  turn 
from  vain  pursuits ;  fame,  the  bubble,  is  bound  to  break 
as  thou  art."  This  is  one  type  of  reaction  against  this 
fear, —  for  men  react  to  the  fear  of  death  variously.  If 
man  is  mortal,  God  is  not,  and  there  is  a  life  everlast- 
ing.   The  life  everlasting  —  whether  a  reality  or  not  — 


174  THE  FOUNDATIONS  OF  PERSONALITY 

is  conjured  up  and  believed  in  by  an  effort  to  compen- 
sate for  the  fear  of  death. 

I  have  a  son  who,  when  he  was  three,  manifested  great 
emotion  if  death  were  to  enter  in  a  story.  "  Will  any- 
thing happen?  "  he  would  ask,  meaning,  "  Will  death 
enter?  "  And  if  so,  he  would  beg  not  to  have  that  story 
told.  But  when  he  was  four,  he  heard  some  one  say  that 
there  were  people  who  took  old  automobiles  apart,  fixed 
up  the  parts  and  these  were  then  placed  in  other  auto- 
mobiles. 

"  That's  what  God  does  to  us,"  he  cried  triumphantly. 
**  When  we  die,  He  takes  us  apart  and  puts  us  into 
babies,  and  we  live  again."  Thereafter  he  would  dis- 
cuss death  as  fearlessly  as  he  spoke  of  dinner,  and  all 
his  fears  vanished.  Here  was  a  typical  rationalization 
of  fear,  one  that  has  helped  to  shape  religion,  philoso- 
phies, ways  of  living.  And  the  widespread  belief  in 
immortality  is  a  compensation  and  a  rationalization  of 
the  fear  of  death. 

If  some  men  rationalize  in  this  fashion,  others  take 
directly  opposite  means.  "  Eat,  drink  and  be  merry, 
for  to-morrow  we  die."  The  popularity  of  Omar  Khay- 
yam rests  upon  the  aptness  of  his  statement  of  this  side 
of  the  case  of  Man  vs.  Death,  and  many  a  man  who  never 
heard  of  him  has  recklessly  plunged  into  dissipation  on 
the  theory,  "  a  short  life  and  a  merry  one."  This  is 
more  truly  a  pessimism  than  is  the  ascetic  philosophy. 

"  Well,  then,  I  must  die,"  says  another.  "  Oh,  that  I 
might  achieve  before  death  comes !  "  So  men,  appalled 
by  the  brief  tenure  of  life  and  the  haphazard  way  death 
strikes,  work  hard,  spurred  on  by  the  wish  to  leave  a 
great  work  behind  them.  This  work  becomes  a  Self, 
left  behind,  and  here  the  fear  of  death  is  compensated 
for  by  a  little  longer  life  in  the  form  of  achievement. 


ENERGY  RELEASE  AND  THE  EMOTIONS  175 

Many  a  father  and  mother,  looking  at  their  children, 
feel  this  as  part  of  their  compensation  for  parenthood. 
"  I  shall  die  and  leave  some  one  behind  me,"  means,  "  I 
shall  die  and  yet  I  shall,  in  another  form,  live."  Part 
of  the  incentive  to  parenthood,  in  a  time  which  knows 
how  to  prevent  parenthood  and  which  shirks  it  as  dis- 
agreeable, is  the  fear  of  death,  of  personal  annihilation. 
For  there  is  in  death  a  blow  to  one's  pride,  an  indignity 
in  this  annihilation, —  Nothingness. 

There  is  a  still  larger  reaction  to  the  fear  of  death. 
I  have  stated  that  the  feeling  of  likeness  is  part  of  the 
feeling  of  brotherhood  and  in  death  is  one  of  the  three 
great  likenesses  of  man.  We  are  bom  of  the  labor  of 
our  mothers,  our  days  are  full  of  strife  and  trouble  and 
we  die.  Men's  minds  have  lingered  on  these  facts.  "  Man 
that  is  born  of  a  woman,  is  of  few  days,  and  full  of  trou- 
ble." Job  did  not  add  to  this  that  he  dies,  but  elsewhere 
it  appears  as  the  bond  for  mankind.  Reacting  to  this, 
the  reflective  minds  of  the  race  have  felt  that  here  was 
the  unity  of  man,  here  the  basis  of  a  brotherhood.  True, 
the  Fatherhood  of  God  was  given  as  a  logical  reason,  but 
always  in  every  appeal  there  is  the  note,  "  Do  we  not 
all  die?     Why  hate  one  another  then?  " 

So  to  the  fear  of  death,  as  with  every  other  fear,  man 
has  reacted  basely  and  nobly.  Man  is  the  only  animal 
that  foresees  death  and  he  is  the  only  one  to  elaborate 
ethics  and  religion.  There  is  more  than  an  accidental 
connection  between  these  two  facts. 

Fear  in  its  foreseeing  character  is  termed  worry.  As 
a  phase  of  character,  the  liability  to  worry  is  of  such 
importance  that  book  after  book  has  dealt  with  the  sub- 
ject,—  emphasizing  the  dangers,  the  futility  and  cow- 
ardice of  it.  It  is  surely  idle  to  tell  people  not  to  worry 
who  live  continually  on  the  brink  of  economic  disaster, 


176  THE  FOUNDATIONS  OF  PERSONALITY 

or  who  are  facing  real  danger.  But  there  are  types  who 
find  in  every  possibility  of  injury  a  formidable  threat, 
who  are  thrown  into  anguish  when  they  contemplate  any 
evil,  remote  or  unlikely  as  it  may  be.  The  present  and 
future  are  not  faced  with  courage  or  equanimity;  they 
present  themselves  as  a  never-ending  series  of  threats; 
threat  to  health,  to  fortune,  to  family,  reputation,  every- 
thing. Horace  Fletcher  called  this  type  of  forethought 
"  fear  thought."  Men  and  women,  brave  enough  when 
face  to  face  with  actualities,  are  cowards  when  confront- 
ing remote  possibilities.  The  housewife  especially  is 
one  of  these  worriers,  and  her  mind  has  an  affinity  for 
the  terrible.  I  have  described  her  elsewhere,^  but  she 
has  her  prototype  among  men. 

Fear  of  this  type  is  an  injury  to  the  body  and  charac- 
ter both  and  is  one  of  the  causes  and  effects  of  the  wide- 
spread neurasthenia  of  our  day.  For  fear  injures  sleep, 
and  this  brings  on  fatigue  and  fatigue  breeds  more  fear, 
—  a  vicious  circle  indeed.  Fear  disturbs  digestion  and 
the  energy  of  the  organism  is  thereby  lowered.  The 
greatest  damage  by  worry  is  done  in  the  hypochondriac, 
the  worrier  about  health.  Here,  in  addition  to  the  ef- 
fects of  fear,  introspection  and  a  minute  attention  to 
every  pain  and  ache  demoralize  the  character,  for  the 
sufferer  cannot  pay  attention  to  anything  else.  He  be- 
comes selfish,  ego-centric  and  without  the  wholesome 
interest  in  life  as  an  adventure.  I  doubt  if  there  is 
enough  good  in  too  minute  a  popular  education  on  dis- 
ease and  health  preservation.  Morbid  attention  to 
health  often  results,  an  evil  worse  than  sickness. 

Sometimes,  instead  of  the  indiscriminate  fear  of 
worry,  there  are  localized  fears,  called  phobias,  which 
creep  or  spring  into  a  man's  thoughts  and  render  him 

* "  The  Nervous  Housewife." 


ENERGY  RELEASE  AND  THE  EMOTIONS  177 

miserable.  Thus  there  is  fear  of  high  places,  of  low 
places,  of  darkness,  of  open  places,  of  closed  places, — 
fear  of  dirt,  fear  of  poison  and  of  almost  everything  else. 
A  bright  young  man  was  locked,  at  the  age  of  fourteen, 
in  a  closed  dark  shanty ;  when  released  he  rushed  home 
in  the  greatest  terror.  Since  then  he  has  been  afflicted 
with  a  fear  of  leaving  home.  He  dares  venture  only 
about  fifty  feet  and  then  is  impelled  to  run  back.  If 
anybody  hinders  his  return  he  attacks  them ;  if  the  door 
is  locked  he  breaks  through  a  window.  He  is  in  a 
veritable  panic,  and  yet  presents  no  other  fears;  is  a 
reader  and  thinker,  clever  at  his  work  (he  is  a  painter), 
but  his  fear  remains  inaccessible  and  uncontrollable. 
Often  one  experience  of  this  kind  builds  up  an  obsessive 
fear;  the  associations  left  by  the  experience  give  the 
fear  an  open  pathway  to  consciousness,  without  any 
inhibiting  power.  As  in  this  case,  the  whole  life  of  the 
individual  becomes  changed. 

Throughout  history  the  man  without  fear  has  been 
idolized.  The  hero  is  courageous,  that  he  must  be;  the 
coward  is  despised,  whatever  good  may  be  in  him.  Con- 
sequently, there  is  in  most  men  a  fear  of  showing  fear ; 
and  pride,  self-respect,  often  urge  men  on  when  they 
really  fear.  This  pride  is  greater  in  some  races  than 
others  —  in  the  Indian  and  the  Anglo-Saxon  —  but  the 
Oriental  does  not  think  it  wrong  to  be  afraid.  In  the 
Great  War  this  fear  of  showing  fear  played  a  great  role 
in  producing  shell  shock,  in  that  men  shrank  from  ac- 
tual cowardice  but  easily  developed  neuroses  which  car- 
ried them  from  the  fighting  line. 

There  is  this  to  add  to  this  little  sketch  of  fear:  it 
turns  easily  to  anger  for  both  are  responses  to  a  threat. 
I  remember  in  my  boyhood  being  mortally  afraid  of  a 
larger  boy  who  one  day  chased  me,  caught  me  and  started 


178  THE  FOUNDATIONS  OF  PERSONALITY 

to  "  beat  me  up."  Before  I  knew  it,  the  fear  had  gone 
and  I  was  fighting  him  with  such  fierceness  and  fury  that 
in  amazement  he  ran  away.  So  a  rat,  cornered,  becomes 
fierce  and  blood-thirsty  and  there  is  always  the  danger, 
in  the  use  of  fear  as  a  weapon,  that  it  become  changed 
quite  readily  into  the  fighting  spirit. 

7.  Anger  is  a  primitive  reaction  and  is  the  backbone 
of  the  fighting  spirit.  It  tends  to  displace  fear,  though 
it  may  be  combined  with  it,  in  one  of  the  most  unhappy 
—  because  helpless  —  mental  states.  Anger  in  its  com- 
monest form  is  a  violent  energizer  and  in  the  stiffened 
muscles,  the  set  jaw,  bared  teeth,  and  the  forward-thrust 
head  and  arms  one  sees  the  animal  prepared  to  fight. 
Anger  is  aroused  at  any  obstruction,  any  threat  or  in- 
jury, from  physical  violences  to  the  so-called  "  slight." 
In  fact,  it  is  the  intent  of  the  opponent  as  understood 
that  makes  up  the  stimulus  to  anger  in  the  human  being. 
We  forgive  a  blow  if  it  is  accidental,  but  even  a  touch,  if 
in  malice  or  in  contempt,  arouses  a  fierce  reaction. 

We  call  becoming  angry  too  readily  "  losing  the  tem- 
per," and  there  is  a  type  known  as  the  irascible  in  whom 
anger  is  the  readiest  emotion.  The  bluff  English  squire, 
the  man  in  authority,  is  this  type,  and  his  anger  lasts. 
In  its  lesser  form  anger  becomes  irritability,  a  reaction 
common  to  the  neurotic  and  the  weak.  When  anger  is 
not  frank,  but  manifests  itself  by  a  lowered  brow  and 
sidelong  look,  we  speak  of  sullenness  or  surliness.  The 
sullen  or  surly  person,  chronically  ill-tempered  and  hos- 
tile, is  regarded  as  unsocial  and  dangerous,  whereas  the 
most  lovable  persons  are  quick  to  anger  and  quick  to 
repent. 

As  a  man's  anger,  so  is  he.  There  are  some  whose 
anger  is  always  a  reaction  against  interference  with 
their  comfort,  their  dignity,  their  property  and  their 


ENERGY  RELEASE  AND  THE  EMOTIONS  179 

\vill ;  it  never  by  any  chance  is  aroused  by  the  wrongs 
of  others.  Usually,  however,  these  folk  camouflage  their 
motive.  "  It's  the  principle  of  the  thing  I  object  to, " 
is  its  commonest  social  disguise,  which  sometimes  suc- 
cessfully hides  the  real  motive  from  the  egoist  himself. 
Wherever  wills  and  purposes  meet  in  conflict,  there 
anger,  or  its  offshoot,  contempt,  is  present,  and  the  more 
egoistic  one  is,  the  more  egoistic  the  sources  of  anger. 

The  explosiveness  of  the  anger  will  depend  on  the 
power  of  inhibition  and  the  power  of  the  intelligence, 
as  well  as  on  the  strength  of  the  opponent.  There  are 
enough  whose  temper  is  uncontrolled  in  the  presence 
of  the  weak  who  manage  to  be  quite  calm  in  the  pres- 
ence of  the  strong.  I  believe  there  is  much  less  differ- 
ence amongst  raoes  in  this  respect  than  we  suspect,  and 
there  is  more  in  tradition  and  training.  There  was  a 
time  when  it  was  perfectly  proper  for  a  gentleman  to 
lose  his  temper,  but  now  that  it  is  held  "  bad  form," 
most  gentlemen  manage  to  control  it. 

If  it  is  common  for  men  to  become  angry  at  ego-injury, 
there  are  in  this  world,  as  its  leaven  of  reform,  noble 
spirits  who  become  angry  at  the  wrongs  of  others.  The 
world  owes  its  progress  to  those  whose  anger,  sustained 
and  intellectualized,  becomes  the  power  behind  reform ; 
to  those  like  Abraham  Lincoln,  who  vowed  to  destroy 
slavery  because  he  saw  a  slave  sold  down  the  river;  to 
the  Pinels,  outraged  by  the  treatment  of  the  insane ;  to 
the  sturdy  "  Indignant  Citizen,"  who  writes  to  news- 
papers about  what  "  is  none  of  his  business,"  but  who 
is  too  angry  to  keep  still,  and  whose  anger  makes  public 
opinion.  Whether  anger  is  useful  or  not  depends  upon 
its  cause  and  the  methods  it  employs.  Righteous  anger, 
whether  against  one's  own  wrongs  or  the  wrongs  of 
others,  is  the  hall-mark  of  the  brave  and  noble  spirit; 


180  THE  FOUNDATIONS  OF  PERSONALITY 

mean,  egoistic  anger  is  a  great  world  danger,  born  of 
prejudice  and  egoism.  A  violent-tempered  child  may  be 
such  because  he  is  outraged  by  wrong;  if  so,  teach  him 
control  but  do  not  tell  him  in  modern  wishy-washy  fash- 
ion that  "  one  must  never  get  angry."  Control  it,  in- 
tellectualize  it,  do  not  permit  it  to  destroy  effectiveness, 
as  it  is  prone  to  do ;  but  it  cannot  be  eliminated  without 
endangering  personality. 

Fear  and  anger  have  this  in  common:  whenever  the 
controlling  energy  of  the  mind  goes,  as  in  illness,  fatigue 
or  early  mental  disease,  they  become  more  prominent 
and  uncontrolled.  This  cannot  be  overemphasized. 
When  a  man  (or  woman)  finds  himself  continually  get- 
ting apprehensive  and  irritable,  then  it  is  the  time  to 
ask,  "  What's  the  matter  with  me,"  and  to  get  expert 
opinion  on  the  subject. 

These  two  emotions  are  in  more  need  of  rationalizing 
and  intelligent  control  than  the  other  emotions,  for  they 
are  more  explosive.  Certainly  of  anger  it  is  truly  said 
that  "  He  who  is  master  of  himself  is  greater  than  he 
who  taketh  a  city."  The  angry  man  is  disliked,  he 
arouses  unpleasant  feelings,  he  is  unpopular  and  a  nui- 
sance and  a  danger  in  the  view  of  his  fellows.  The  under- 
lying idea  underneath  courtesy  and  social  regulations  is 
to  avoid  anger  and  humiliation.  Controversial  subjects 
are  avoided,  and  one  must  not  brag  or  display  concern 
because  these  things  cause  anger  and  disgust.  Polite- 
ness and  tact  are  essential  to  turn  away  wrath,  to  avoid 
that  ego  injury  that  brings  anger. 

We  contrast  with  the  brusque  type,  careless  of  whether 
he  arouses  anger,  the  tactful,  which  conciliates  by  avoid- 
ing prejudice,  and  which  hates  force  and  anger  as  un- 
pleasant. Against  the  quick  to  anger  there  is  the  slow 
type,  whose  anger  may  be  enduring.    We  may  contrast 


ENERGY  RELEASE  AND  THE  EMOTIONS  181 

egoistic  anger  with  the  altruistic  and  oppose  the  anger 
which  is  effective  with  the  anger  that  disturbs  reason 
and  judgment;  intellectual  anger  against  brute  anger. 
Rarely  do  men  show  anger  to  their  superiors;  extreme 
provocation  and  desperation  are  necessary.  Men  flare 
up  easily  against  equals  but  more  easily  and  with  min- 
gled contempt  against  the  inferior.  Anger,  though  be- 
hind the  fighting  spirit,  need  not  bluster  or  storm; 
usually  that  is  a  "  worked  up  "  condition  intended  in 
a  naive  way  to  frighten  and  intimidate,  or  through  dis- 
gust, to  win  a  point.  Anger  is  not  necessarily  courage, 
which  replaces  it  the  higher  up  one  goes  in  culture. 

8.  Disgust,  also  a  primary  emotion,  is  one  of  the  basic 
reactions  of  life  and  civilization.  Literally  "  disagree- 
able taste,"  its  facial  expression,  with  mouth  open  and 
lower  lip  drawn  down,^  is  that  preliminary  to  vomiting. 
We  eject  or  retract  when  disgusted;  we  are  not  afraid 
nor  are  we  angry.  We  say  "  he  —  or  she,  or  it  —  makes 
me  sick,"  and  this  is  the  stock  phrase  of  disgust.  Inele- 
gant as  it  is,  it  exactly  expresses  the  situation.  Disgust 
easily  mingles  with  fear  and  anger ;  it  is  often  dispelled 
by  curiosity  and  interest,  as  in  the  morbid,  as  in  medi- 
cal science,  and  it  often  displaces  less  intense  curiosity 
and  interest. 

After  anything  has  been  accepted  as  standard  in 
cleanliness,  a  deviation  in  a  "  lower  "  direction  causes 
disgust.  Those  who  are  accustomed  to  clean  tablecloths, 
clean  linen  are  disgusted  by  dirty  tablecloths,  dirty 
linen.  The  excreta  of  the  body  have  been  so  effectively 
tabooed,  in  the  interest  perhaps  of  sanitation,  that  their 
sight  or  smell  is  disgusting,  and  they  are  used  as  sym- 
bols of  disgust  in  everyday  language.     Indeed,  the  so- 

'  See  Darwin's  "  The  Expression  of  Emotions  in  Man  and  Animals," 
—  a  great  book  by  a  great  man. 


182  THE  FOUNDATIONS  OF  PERSONALITY 

called  animal  functions  have  to  be  decorated  and  cere- 
monialized  to  avoid  disgust.  We  turn  with  ridicule 
and  repugnance  from  him  who  eats  without  "  manners  " 
and  one  of  the  functions  of  manners  is  to  avoid  arousing 
disgust. 

Disgust  kills  desire  and  passion,  and  from  that  fact 
we  may  trace  a  large  part  of  moral  progress.  Satiety 
brings  a  slight  disgust;  thus  after  a  heavy  meal  there 
may  be  contentment  but  the  sight  of  food  is  not  at  all 
appealing  and  often  enough  rather  repelling.  In  the 
sex  field,  a  deep  repulsion  is  often  felt  when  lust  alone 
has  brought  the  man  and  woman  together  or  when  the 
situation  is  illegal  or  unhallowed.  With  satisfaction  of 
desire,  the  inhibiting  forces  come  to  their  own,  and  the 
violence  of  repentance  and  disgust  may  be  extreme. 
Stanley  Hall,  Havelock  Ellis  and  other  writers  lay  stress 
on  this ;  and,  indeed,  one  of  the  bases  of  asceticism  is  this 
disgust.  Further,  when  we  have  no  desires  or  passion, 
the  sight  of  others  hugging  and  kissing,  or  acting  "  inti- 
mate" in  any  way,  is  usually  disgusting,  an  offense 
against  "good  taste"  based  on  the  "bad  taste"  it  arouses 
in  the  observer.  In  memory  we  are  often  disgusted  at 
what  we  did  in  the  heat  of  desire,  but  usually  memory 
itself  does  not  prevent  us  from  repeating  the  act ;  desire 
itself  must  slacken.  Thus  the  old  are  often  intensely 
disgusted  at  the  conduct  of  the  young,  and  it  is  never 
wise  for  a  young  couple  to  live  with  older  people.  For 
in  the  early  days  of  married  life  the  intensity  of  the 
intimate  feelings  needs  seclusion  in  order  to  avoid  dis- 
gusting others.  It  is  no  accident  that  Dame  Grundy 
is  depicted  as  an  elderly  person  with  a  "  sour  look  " ; 
her  prudishness  has  an  origin  in  disgust  at  that  which 
she  has  outlived.     Sometimes  the  old  are  wise  —  not 


ENERGY  RELEASE  AND  THE  EMOTIONS  183 

often  enough  —  and  then  their  humor,  love  and  sym- 
pathy keeps  them  from  disgust. 

Love  counteracts  disgust.  The  young  girl  who  turns 
in  loathing  from  uncleanliness  finds  it  easy  and  a  pleas- 
ure to  care  for  her  soiled  baby.  In  fact,  tender  feeling 
of  any  kind  overcomes  —  or  tends  to  overcome  —  dis- 
gust ;  and  pity,  the  tenderest  of  all  feelings  and  without 
passion,  impels  us  to  march  into  the  very  jaws  of  dis- 
gust. The  angry  may  have  no  pity, —  but  they  are  not 
less  unkind  in  commission  than  the  disgusted  are  un- 
kind in  omission.  Thus  a  too  refined  breeding  leads  peo- 
ple away  from  effective  pity  and  that  sturdiness  of 
conduct  which  is  real  philanthropy.  Indeed,  too  much 
of  refinement  increases  the  number  of  disgusting  things 
in  the  world ;  he  who  must  have  this  or  that  luxury  is 
not  so  much  pleased  with  it  as  disgusted  without  it. 
Raising  standards  in  things  material  cannot  increase 
the  happiness  or  contentment  of  the  world,  for  it  merely 
makes  men  impatient  and  disgusted  at  lesser  standards. 
We  cannot  hope  to  increase  happiness  through  the  ma- 
terial improvements  of  civilization. 

Self-disgust  and  shame  are  not  identical  but  are  so 
kindred  that  shame  may  well  be  studied  here.  Shame 
is  lowered  self-valuation,  brought  on  by  social  or  self- 
disapproval.  Usually  it  is  acute  and,  like  fear,  it  tends 
to  make  the  individual  hide  or  fly.  It  is  based  on  in- 
sight, and  there  are  thus  some  who  are  never  ashamed, 
simply  because  they  do  not  understand  disapproval. 
Shame  is  essentially  a  feeling  of  inferiority,  and  when 
we  say  to  a  man,  "  Shame  on  you,"  we  say,  "  You  have 
done  wrong,  humble  yourself,  be  little !  "  When  we  say, 
"  I  am  ashamed  of  you,"  we  say,  "  I  had  pride  in  you ; 
I  enlarged  myself  through  you,  and  now  you  make  me 
little."    When  the  community  cries  shame,  it  uses  a 


184  THE  FOUNDATIONS  OF  PERSONALITY 

force  that  redresses  wrong  by  the  need  of  the  one  ad- 
dressed to  vindicate  himself.  When  a  man  feels  shame 
he  feels  small,  inferior  in  his  own  eyes  and  in  the  eyes 
of  others.  He  feels  impelled,  if  he  is  generous,  to  make 
amends  or  to  do  penance,  and  thus  he  recovers  his  self- 
esteem.  Unfortunately,  shame  arises  more  frequently 
and  often  more  violently  from  a  violation  of  custom  and 
manner  than  from  a  violation  of  ethics  or  morals.  Thus 
we  are  more  ashamed  of  the  so-called  "  bad  break  "  than 
of  our  failures  to  be  kind.  Sometimes  our  fellow  feeling 
is  so  strong  that  we  avoid  seeing  any  one  who  is  humili- 
ated or  embarrassed,  because  sympathy  spreads  his  feel- 
ing to  us.  Gentle  people  are  those  who  dislike  to  shame 
any  one  else,  and  often  one  of  this  type  will  endure 
being  wronged  rather  than  reprimand  or  cause  humilia- 
tion and  shame.  Let  something  be  said  to  shame  any 
member  of  a  company  and  a  feeling  of  shame  spreads 
through  the  group,  except  in  the  case  of  those  who  are 
very  hostile. 

Disgust,  too,  is  extremely  contagious,  especially  its 
manifestations.  One  of  the  most  crude  of  all  manifes- 
tations, to  spit  upon  some  one,  is  a  symbol  taken  from 
disgust,  though  it  has  come  to  mean  contempt,  which  is 
a  mixture  of  hatred  and  disgust. 

To  raise  the  tastes  and  not  raise  the  acquisitions  is 
a  sure  way  to  bring  about  chronic  disgust,  which  is 
really  an  angry  dissatisfaction  mixed  with  disgust.  This 
type  of  reaction  is  very  common  as  a  factor  in  neuras- 
thenia. In  fact,  my  motto  is  "  search  for  the  disgust " 
in  all  cases  of  neurasthenia  and  "  search  for  it  in  the 
intimate — often  secret — desires  and  relationships.  Seek 
for  it  in  the  husband-wife  relationship,  especially  from 
the  standpoint  of  the  wife."  Women,  we  say,  are  more 
refined  in  their  feelings  than  men,  which  is  another  way 


ENERGY  RELEASE  AND  THE  EMOTIONS  185 

of  saying  they  are  more  easily  disgusted  and  therefore 
more  easily  injured.  For  disgust  is  an  injury,  when 
chronic  or  too  easily  elicited,  and  is  then  a  sign  and 
symbol  of  weakness. 

Thus  disgust  is  a  great  reenforcer  of  social  taboo  and 
custom,  as  well  as  morality.  Just  as  it  fails  to  keep 
us  from  eating  the  wrong  kind  of  foods,  so  it  may  fail 
to  keep  us  from  the  wrong  conduct.  Like  every  emotion 
it  is  only  in  part  adapted  to  our  lives,  and  in  those  people 
where  it  becomes  a  prominent  emotion  it  is  a  great  mis- 
chief worker,  subordinating  life  to  finickiness  and  hin- 
dering the  growth  of  generous  feeling. 

9.  We  come  to  two  opposite  emotions,  very  readily 
considered  together.  One  of  the  linkings  of  opposites 
is  in  the  connection  of  Joy  and  Sorrow.  Whether  these 
are  primary  emotions  or  outgrowths  of  Pleasure  and 
Pain  I  leave  to  others.  For  Shand  the  fact  that  joy 
tends  to  prolong  a  situation  in  which  it  occurs  raises 
it  into  an  active  emotion. 

Joy  is  perhaps  the  most  energizing  of  the  emotions 
for  it  tends  to  express  itself  in  shouts,  smiles  and  laugh- 
ter, dancing  and  leaping.  Sorrow  ordinarily  is  quite 
the  reverse  and  expresses  itself  by  immobility,  bowed 
head  and  hands  that  shut  out  from  the  view  the  sights 
of  the  world.  There  is,  however,  a  quiet  joy  called 
relief,  which  is  like  sailing  into  a  smooth,  safe  harbor 
after  a  tempestuous  voyage;  and  there  is  an  agitated 
grief,  with  lamentation,  the  wringing  of  hands  and  self- 
punishment  of  a  frantic  kind.  Joy  and  triumph  are 
closely  associated,  sorrow  and  defeat  likewise.  There 
are  some  whose  rivalry-competitive  feelings  are  so  wide- 
spread that  they  cannot  rejoice  even  at  the  triumph  of 
a  friend,  and  a  little  of  that  nature  is  in  even  the 
noblest  of  us.     There  are  others  who  find  sorrow  in 


186  THE  FOUNDATIONS  OF  PERSONALITY 

defeat  of  an  enemy,  so  widespread  is  their  sympathy. 
This  is  the  generous  victor.  For  the  most  of  us  youth 
is  the  most  joyous  period  because  youth  finds  in  its 
pleasures  a  novelty  and  freshness  that  tend  to  disappear 
with  experience.  For  the  same  reason  the  sorrow  of 
youth,  though  evanescent,  is  unreasoning  and  intense. 

Joy  and  sorrow  are  reactions  and  they  are  noble  or 
the  reverse,  according  to  the  nature  of  the  person.  Joy 
may  be  noble,  sensuous,  trivial  or  mean ;  many  a  "  jolly  " 
person  is  such  because  he  has  no  real  sympathy.  At  the 
present  time  not  one  of  us  could  rejoice  over  anything 
could  we  see  and  sympathize  deeply  with  the  misery  of 
Europe  and  China,  to  say  nothing  of  that  in  our  own 
country.  Nay,  any  wrong  to  others  would  blast  all  our 
pleasure,  could  we  really  feel  it.  Fortunately  only  a 
few  are  so  cursed  with  sympathy.  When  the  capacity 
for  joyous  feeling  is  joined  with  fortitude  or  endurance, 
then  we  have  the  really  cheerful,  who  spread  their  feel- 
ing everywhere,  whom  all  men  love.  Where  cheerful- 
ness is  due  to  lack  of  sympathy  and  understanding,  we 
speak  of  a  cheerful  idiot ;  and  well  does  that  type  merit 
the  name.  There  is  a  modem  cult  whose  followers  sing 
"  La,  la,  la  "  at  all  times  and  places,  who  minimize  all 
misfortune,  crime,  suffering,  who  find  "  good  in  every- 
thing," —  the  "  Pollyana  "  tribe.  My  objection  to  them 
is  based  on  this,  —  that  mankind  must  see  clearly  in 
order  to  rid  itself  of  unnecessary  suffering.  Hiding 
one's  head  (and  brains)  in  a  desert  of  optimism  merely 
perpetuates  evil,  even  though  one  sufferer  here  and  there 
is  deluded  into  happiness. 

Sorrow  may  enrich  the  nature  or  it  may  embitter  and 
narrow  it.  Wisdom  may  spring  from  it;  indeed,  who 
can  be  wise  who  has  not  sorrowed?    Says  Goethe: 


ENERGY  RELEASE  AND  THE  EMOTIONS  187 

*'Wer  nie  sein  Brot  in  Thrdnen  ass 

Wer  nie  die  hummervollen  Ndchte 
Auf  seinem  Beiie  weinend  sass 

Er  weiss  Euch  nicht — himmelischen  MdcMe." 

The  afflicted  in  their  sorrow  may  turn  from  self-seek- 
ing to  God  and  good  deeds.  But  sorrow  may  come  in 
a  trivial  nature  from  trivial  causes;  the  soul  may  be 
plunged  into  despair  because  one  has  been  denied  a  gift 
or  a  pleasure.  The  demonstrativeness  of  grief  or  sor- 
row is  not  at  all  in  proportion  to  the  emotion  felt;  it  is 
more  often  based  on  the  effort  to  get  sympathy  and  help. 
For  sorrow  is  "  Help,  help  "  in  one  form  or  another, 
even  though  one  refuses  to  be  comforted.  All  our  emo- 
tions, because  they  are  socially  powerful,  become  some- 
what theatrical ;  in  some  completely  theatrical.  We  are 
so  constituted  that  emotional  display  is  not  indifferent 
to  us;  it  pleases,  repels,  annoys,  angers,  frightens,  dis- 
gusts or  awes  us  according  to  the  kind  of  emotion  dis- 
played, the  displayer  and  the  circumstances. 

The  psychologists  speak  of  sympathy  as  this  suscep- 
tibility to  the  emotions  of  others,  but  there  is  an  antip- 
athy to  their  emotions,  as  well.  If  we  feel  that  our 
emotions  will  be  "  well  received,"  we  do  not  fear  to 
display  them,  and  therein  is  one  of  the  uses  of  the 
friend.  If  we  feel  that  they  will  be  poorly  received, 
that  they  will  annoy  or  anger  or  disgust,  we  strive  to 
repress  them.  The  expression  of  emotion,  especially  of 
fear  and  sorrow,  has  become  synonymous  with  weakness, 
and  a  powerful  self -feeling  operates  against  their  dis- 
play, especially  in  adults,  men  and  certain  races.  It 
is  no  accident  that  the  greatest  actors  are  from  the 
Latin  and  Hebrew  races,  for  there  is  a  certain  theatri- 
cality in  fear  and  sorrow  that  those  schooled  to  repres- 
sion   lose.     We    resent   what   we   call    insincerity   in 


188  THE  FOUNDATIONS  OF  PERSONALITY 

emotional  expression  because  we  fear  being  "fooled," 
and  there  are  many  whose  experiences  in  being  "  fooled  " 
chill  sympathy  with  doubt.  We  resent  insincere  sym- 
pathy, on  the  other  hand,  because  we  regret  showing 
weakness  before  those  to  whom  that  weakness  is  re- 
garded as  such  and  who  perhaps  rejoice  at  it  as  ridicu- 
lous. We  like  the  emotional  expression  of  children 
because  we  can  always  sympathize,  through  our  tender 
feeling  with  them,  and  their  very  sincerity  pleases  aa 
well. 

Is  there  a  harm  in  the  repression  of  emotion?  ^  Is 
emotion  a  heaped-up  tension  which,  unless  it  is  dis- 
charged, causes  damage?  Shall  man  inhibit  his  anger, 
fear,  joy,  sorrow,  disgust,  at  least  in  some  measure,  or 
shall  he  express  them  in  gesture,  speech  and  act?  The 
answer  is  obvious:  he  must  control  them,  and  in  that 
term  control  we  mean,  not  inhibition,  not  expression  in 
its  n^ve  sense,  but  that  combination  of  inhibition,  ex- 
pression and  intelligent  act  we  call  adjustment.  To 
express  fear  in  the  face  of  danger  or  anger  at  an  offense 
might  thwart  the  whole  life's  purpose,  might  bring  dis- 
aster and  ruin.  The  emotions  are  poor  adjustments  in 
their  most  violent  form,  their  natural  form,  and  invite 
disaster  by  clouding  the  intelligence  and  obscuring  per- 
manent purposes.  Therefore,  they  must  be  controlled. 
To  establish  this  control  is  a  primary  function  of  train- 
ing and  intelligence  and  does  no  harm  unless  carried  to 
excess.  True,  there  is  a  relief  in  emotional  expression, 
a  wiping  out  of  sorrow  by  tears,  an  increase  of  the 
pleasure  of  joy  in  freely  laughing,  a  discharge  of  anger 
in  the  blow  or  the  hot  word,  even  the  profane  word. 
There  is  a  time  and  a  place  for  these  things,  and  to  get 

*  leader  N.  Coriat'B  book,  "  The  Repression  of  Emotions "  deals  with 
the  subject  from  psychoanalytic  point  of  view. 


ENERGY  RELEASE  AND  THE  EMOTIONS  189 

so  "  controlled  "  that  one  rarely  laughs  or  shows  sad- 
ness or  anger  is  to  atrophy,  to  dry  up.  But  the  emo- 
tional expression  makes  it  easy  to  become  an  habitual 
weeper  or  stormer,  makes  it  easy  to  become  the  over- 
emotional  type,  whose  reaction  to  life  is  futile,  undigni- 
fied and  a  bodily  injury.  For  emotion  is  in  large  part 
a  display  of  energy,  and  the  overemotional  rarely  escape 
the  depleted  neurasthenic  state.  In  fact,  hysteria  and 
neurasthenia  are  much  more  common  in  the  races  freely 
expressing  emotion  than  in  the  stolid,  repressed  races. 
Jew,  Italian,  French  and  Irish  figure  much  more  largely 
than  English,  Scotch  or  Norwegian  in  the  statistics  of 
neurasthenia  and  hysteria. 

10.  I  have  said  but  little  on  other  emotions, —  on  ad- 
miration, surprise  and  awe.  This  group  of  affective 
states  is  of  great  importance.  Surprise  may  be  either 
agreeable  or  disagreeable  and  is  our  reaction  to  the 
unexpected.  Its  expression,  facially  and  of  body,  is 
quite  characteristic,  with  staring  eyes  and  mouth  slightly 
open,  raised  eyebrows,  hands  hanging  with  fingers 
tensely  spread  apart,  so  that  a  thing  held  therein  is 
apt  to  drop.  Surprise  heightens  the  feeling  of  internal 
tension,  and  in  all  excitement  it  is  an  element,  in  that 
the  novel  brings  excitement  and  surprise,  whereas  the 
accustomed  gives  little  excitement  or  surprises.  In  all 
wit  and  humor  surprise  is  part  of  the  technique  and  con- 
stitutes part  of  the  pleasure.  Surprise  usually  height- 
ens the  succeeding  feeling,  whether  of  joy,  sorrow,  anger, 
fear,  pleasure  or  pain,  or  in  any  form.  But  sometimes 
the  effect  of  surprise  is  so  benumbing  that  an  incapacity 
to  feel,  to  realize,  is  the  most  marked  result  and  it  is 
only  afterward  that  the  proper  emotion  or  feeling  be- 
comes manifest. 


190  THE  FOUNDATIONS  OF  PERSONALITY 

The  reaction  to  the  unexpected  is  an  important  ad- 
justment in  character.  There  are  situations  beyond 
the  power  of  any  of  us  quickly  to  adjust  ourselves  to 
and  we  expect  the  great  catastrophe  to  surprise  and 
overwhelm.  Nevertheless,  we  judge  people  by  the  way 
they  react  to  the  unexpected;  the  man  who  rallies 
quickly  from  the  confusion  of  surprise  is,  we  say,  "  cool- 
headed,"  keeps  his  wits  about  him;  and  the  man  who 
does  not  so  rally  or  adjust  "  loses  his  head,"  —  "  loses 
his  wits."  Part  of  this  cool-headedness  is  not  only  the 
rallying  from  surprise  but  also  the  throwing  off  of  fear. 
A  warning  has  for  its  purpose,  "  Don't  be  surprised," 
and  training  must  teach  resources  against  the  unex- 
pected. "  If  you  expect  everything  you  are  armed 
against  half  the  trouble  of  the  world."  The  cautious  in 
character  minimize  the  number  of  surprises  they  may 
get  by  preparing.  The  impulsive,  who  rarely  prepare, 
are  always  in  danger  from  the  unforeseen.  Aside  from 
preparation  and  knowledge,  there  is  in  the  condition  of 
the  organism  a  big  factor  in  the  reaction  to  the  unex- 
pected. Fatigue,  neurasthenia,  hysteria  and  certain 
depressed  conditions  render  a  man  more  liable  to  react 
excessively  and  badly  to  surprise.  The  tired  soldier 
has  lessened  resources  in  wit  and  courage  when  sur- 
prised, for  fatigue  heightens  the  confusion  and  numb- 
ness of  surprise  and  decreases  the  scope  of  intelligent 
conduct.  Choice  is  made  difficult,  and  the  neurasthenic 
doubt  is  transformed  to  impotence  by  surprise. 

Face  to  face  with  what  is  recognized  as  superior  to 
ourselves  in  a  quality  we  hold  to  be  good,  we  fall  into 
that  emotional  state,  a  mingling  of  surprise  and  pleas- 
ure, called  admiration.  In  its  original  usage,  admira- 
tion meant  wonder,  and  there  is  in  all  admiration 


ENERGY  RELEASE  AND  THE  EMOTIONS  191 

something  of  that  feeling  which  is  born  in  the  presence 
of  the  superior.  The  more  profound  the  admiration, 
the  greater  is  the  proportion  of  wonder  in  the  feeling. 

We  find  it  difficult  to  admire  where  the  competitive 
feeling  is  strongly  aroused,  though  there  are  some  who 
can  do  so.  It  is  the  essence  of  good  sportsmanship,  the 
ideal  aimed  at,  to  admire  the  rival  for  his  good  qualities, 
though  sticking  fast  to  one's  confidence  in  oneself. 
The  English  and  American  athletes,  perhaps  also  the 
athletes  of  other  countries,  make  this  part  of  their  code 
of  conduct  and  so  are  impelled  to  act  in  a  way  not  en- 
tirely sincere.  Wherever  jealousy  or  envy  are  strongly 
aroused,  admiration  is  impossible,  and  so  it  comes  about 
that  men  find  it  easy  to  praise  men  in  other  noncom- 
petitive fields  or  for  qualities  in  which  they  are  not 
competing.  Thus  an  author  may  strongly  admire  an 
athlete  or  a  novelist  may  praise  the  historian;  a  beau- 
tiful woman  admires  another  for  her  learning,  though 
with  some  reservation  in  her  praise,  and  a  successful 
business  man  admires  the  self-sacrificing  scientist,  albeit 
there  is  a  little  complacency  in  his  approval. 

He  is  truly  generous-hearted  who  can  admire  his 
competitor.  I  do  not  mean  lip-admiration,  through  the 
fear  of  being  held  jealous.  Many  a  man  joins  in  the 
praise  of  one  who  has  outstripped  him,  with  envy  gnaw- 
ing at  his  heart,  and  waits  for  the  first  note  of  criticism 
to  get  out  the  hammer.  "  He  is  very  fine  —  but "  is 
the  formula,  and  either  through  innuendo,  insinuation 
or  direct  attack,  the  "  subordinate  "  statement  becomes 
the  most  sincere  and  significant.  But  there  are  those 
who  can  admire  their  conqueror,  not  only  through  the 
masochism  that  lurks  in  all  of  us,  but  because  they 
have  lifted  their  ideal  of  achievement  and  character 


192   THE  FOUNDATIONS  OF  PERSONALITY 

higher  than  their  own  possibilities  and  seek  in  others 
the  perfection  they  cannot  hope  to  have  in  themselves. 
In  other  words,  where  competition  is  hopeless,  in  the 
presence  of  the  greatly  superior,  a  feeling  of  humility 
which  is  really  admiration  to  the  point  of  worship  comes 
over  us,  and  we  can  glory  in  the  quality  we  love.  To 
admire  is  to  recede  the  ego-feeling,  is  to  feel  oneself 
in  an  ecstasy  that  becomes  mystical,  and  in  that  sense 
the  contradiction  arises  that  we  feel  ourselves  larger 
in  a  unification  with  the  admired  one. 

Each  age,  each  country,  each  group  and  each  family 
set  up  the  objects  and  qualities  for  admiration,  in  a 
word,  the  ideals.  Out  of  these  the  individual  selects  his 
specialties  in  admiration,  according  to  his  nature  and 
training.  All  the  world  admires  vigor,  strength,  cour- 
age and  endurance, —  and  these  in  their  physical  aspects. 
The  hero  of  all  times  has  had  these  qualities:  he  is 
energetic,  capable  of  feats  beyond  the  power  of  others, 
is  fearless  and  bears  his  ills  with  equanimity.  Beauty, 
especially  in  the  woman,  but  also  in  man,  has  received 
an  over-great  share  of  homage,  but  here  "  tastes  differ." 
We  have  no  difficulty  in  agreement  on  what  constitutes 
strength,  and  we  have  objective  tests  for  its  measure- 
ment; but  who  can  agree  on  beauty?  What  one  race 
prizes  as  its  fairest  is  scorned  by  another  race.  We 
laugh  at  the  ideal  of  beauty  of  the  Hottentot,  and  the 
physical  peculiarity  they  praise  most  either  disgusts 
or  amuses  us.  But  what  is  there  about  a  white  skin 
more  lovely  than  a  black  one,  and  why  thrill  over  blue 
eyes  and  neglect  the  brown  ones?  What  is  the  rationale 
for  the  admiration  of  slimness  as  against  stoutness? 
Indeed,  there  are  races  who  would  turn  with  scorn  from 


ENERGY  RELEASE  AND  THE  EMOTIONS  193 

our  slender  debutante  ^  and  worship  their  more  buxom 
heavy-busted  and  wide-hipped  beauties.  The  only 
"  rational "  beauty  in  face  and  figure  is  that  which 
stands  as  the  outer  mask  of  health,  vigor,  intelligence 
and  normal  procreative  function.  The  standards  set  up 
in  each  age  and  place  usually  arise  from  local  pride, 
from  the  familiar  type.  The  Mongolian  who  finds  beauty 
in  his  slanting-eyed,  wide-cheek  boned,  yellow  mate  has 
as  valid  a  sanction  as  the  Anglo-Saxon  who  worships 
at  the  shrine  of  his  wide-eyed,  straight-nosed  blonde. 

When  we  leave  the  physical  qualities  and  pass  to  the 
mental  we  again  find  a  lack  of  agreement  as  to  the 
admirable.  All  agree  that  intelligence  is  to  be  admired, 
but  how  shall  that  intelligence  be  manifested?  In 
practice,  the  major  part  of  the  world  admires  the  in- 
telligence that  is  financially  and  socially  successful, 
and  the  rich  and  powerful  have  the  greatest  share  of 
the  world's  praise.  Power,  strength,  and  superiority 
command  admiration,  even  from  the  unwilling,  and  the 
philosopher  who  stands  aloof  from  the  world  and  is 
without  real  strength  finds  himself  admiring  a  crude, 
bustling  fellow  ordering  men  about.  True,  we  admire 
such  acknowledged  great  intelligences  as  Plato,  Galileo, 
Newton,  Pascal,  Darwin,  etc.,  but  in  reality  only  a 
fragment  of  the  men  and  women  of  any  country  know 
anything  at  all  about  these  men,  and  the  admiration  of 
most  is  an  acceptance  of  the  authority  of  others  as  to 
what  it  is  proper  to  admire.  Genuine  admiration  is  in 
proportion  to  the  intelligence  and  idealism  of  the  ad- 
mirer. And  there  are  in  this  country  a  thousand  intense 
admirers  of  Babe  Ruth  and  his  mighty  baseball  club 

*The  peasant  type,  greatly  admfred  by  the  agricultural  folk  of  Cen- 
tral Europe,  is  stout  and  ruddy.  This  is  a  better  ideal  of  beauty  than 
the  lily-white,  slender  and  dainty  maid  of  the  cultured,  who  very  often 
can  neither  work  nor  bear  and  nurse  children. 


194   THE  FOUNDATIONS  OF  PERSONALITY 

to  one  who  pours  out  his  soul  before  the  image  of  Pas- 
teur. You  may  know  a  man  (or  woman)  not  by  his 
lip-homage,  but  by  what  he  genuinely  admires,  by  that 
which  evokes  his  real  enthusiasm  and  praise.  Judge 
by  that  and  then  note  that  the  most  constant  admira- 
tion of  the  women  of  our  country  goes  out  to  actresses, 
actors,  professional  beauties,  with  popular  authors  and 
lecturers  a  bad  second,  and  that  of  the  men  is  evoked 
by  prize  fighters,  ball  players  and  the  rich.  No  wonder 
the  problems  of  the  world  find  no  solution,  for  it  is 
only  by  fits  and  starts  that  men  and  women  admire 
real  intelligence  and  real  ability.  The  orator  has  more 
admirers  than  the  thinker,  and  this  is  the  curse  of  poli- 
tics ;  the  executive  has  more  admirers  than  the  research 
worker,  and  this  is  the  bane  of  industry ;  the  entertainer 
is  more  admired  than  the  educator,  and  that  is  why 
Charlie  Chaplin  makes  a  million  a  year  and  President 
Eliot  received  only  a  few  thousand.  The  race  and  the 
nation  has  its  generous  enthusiasms  and  its  bursts  of 
admiration  for  the  noble,  but  its  real  admiration  it 
gives  to  those  whom  it  best  understands.  Fortunately 
the  leaders  of  the  race  have  more  of  generosity  and 
fine  admiration  than  have  the  mass  they  lead.  Left  to 
itself,  the  mass  of  the  race  limits  its  hero-worship  to 
the  lesser,  unworthy  race  of  heroes. 

The  school  histories,  which  should  emphasize 
the  admirable  as  well  as  point  out  the  reverse,  have 
played  a  poor  role  in  education.  The  hero  they  depict 
is  the  warrior,  and  they  fire  the  hearts  of  the  child  with 
admiration  and  desire  for  emulation.  They  say  almost 
nothing  of  the  great  inventors,  scientists  and  philan- 
thropists. The  teaching  of  history  should,  above 
all,  set  up  heroes  for  the  child  to  study,  admire  and 
emulate.     "  When  the  half -gods  go  the  gods  arrive." 


ENERGY  RELEASE  AND  THE  EMOTIONS  195 

The  stage  of  history  as  taught  is  cluttered  with  the 
tin-plate  shedders  of  blood  to  the  exclusion  of  the 
greater  men.^ 

When  the  object  that  confronts  us  is  so  superior,  so 
vast,  that  we  sink  into  insignificance,  then  admiration 
takes  on  a  tinge  of  fear  in  the  state  or  feeling  of  awe. 
All  men  feel  awe  in  the  presence  of  strength  and  mys- 
tery, so  that  the  concept  of  God  is  that  most  wrapped 
up  with  this  emotion,  and  the  ceremonies  with  which 
kings  and  institutions  have  been  surrounded  strike  awe 
by  their  magnificence  and  mystery  into  the  hearts  of 
the  governed.  We  contemplate  natural  objects,  such 
as  mountains,  mighty  rivers  and  the  oceans,  with  awe 
because  we  feel  so  little  and  puny  in  comparison,  and 
we  do  not  "  enjoy  "  contemplating  them  because  we 
hate  to  feel  little.  Or  else  we  grow  familiar  with  them, 
and  the  awe  disappears.  The  popular  and  the  familiar 
are  never  awe-full,  and  even  death  loses  in  dignity  when 
one  has  dissected  a  few  bodies.  So  objects  viewed  by 
night  or  in  gloom  inspire  awe,  though  seen  by  day  they 
are  stripped  of  mystery  and  interest.  To  the  adolescent 
boy,  woman  is  a  creature  to  be  regarded  with  awe, — 
beautiful,  strangely  powerful  and  mysterious.  To  the 
grown-up  man,  enriched  and  disillusioned  by  a  few 
experiences,  woman,  though  still  loved,  is  no  longer 
worshiped. 

Though  the  reverent  spirit  is  admirable  and  poetic, 
it  is  not  by  itself  socially  valuable.  It  has  been  played 
upon  by  every  false  prophet,  every  enslaving  institution. 
It  prevents  free  inquiry ;  it  says  to  science,  "  Do  not 
inquire  here.     They   who  believe   do  not  investigate. 

*  Plutarch's  Lives  are  an  example  of  the  praise  and  place  given  to 
the  soldier  and  orator;  and  many  a  child,  reading  them,  has  burned 
to  be  an  Alexander  or  a  Csesar.  Wells'  History,  with  all  its  defects, 
pushes  the  "  conquerors "  to  their  real  place  as  enemies  of  the  race. 


196  THE  FOUNDATIONS  OF  PERSONALITY 

This  is  too  holy  a  place  for  you."  We  who  believe  in 
science  deny  that  anything  can  be  so  holy  that  it  can 
be  cheapened  by  light,  and  we  believe  that  face  to  face 
with  the  essential  mysteries  of  life  itself  even  the  most 
assiduous  and  matter-of-fact  must  feel  awe.  Man,  the 
little,  has  probed  into  the  secrets  of  the  universe  of 
which  he  is  a  part.  What  he  has  learned,  what  he  can 
learn,  make  him  bow  his  head  with  a  reverence  no  wor- 
shiper of  dogmatic  mysteries  can  ever  feel. 


CHAPTER  X 

COUEAGB,     RESIGNATION,     SUBLIMATION,     PATIENCE,     THE 
WISH,  AND  ANHEDONIA 

In  the  preceding  chapter  we  spoke  of  the  feeling  of 
energy  and  certain  of  the  basic  emotions  —  such  as  fear, 
anger,  joy,  sorrow,  disgust,  surprise  and  admiration. 
It  is  important  to  know  that  rarely  does  a  man  react 
to  any  life  situation  in  which  the  feeling  of  energy  is 
not  an  emotional  constituent  and  governs  in  a  general 
way  that  reaction.  Moreover,  fear,  anger,  joy  and  the 
other  feelings  described  mingle  with  this  energy  feel- 
ing and  so  are  built  great  systems  of  the  affective  life. 

1.  Courage  is  one  of  these  systems.  It  is  not  merely 
the  absence  of  fear  that  constitutes  courage,  though  we 
interchange  "  fearless "  with  "  courageous."  Fre- 
quently it  is  the  conquest  of  fear  by  the  man  himself 
that  leads  him  to  the  highest  courage.  There  is  a  type 
of  courage  based  on  the  lack  of  imagination,  the  inability 
to  see  ahead  the  disaster  that  lurks  around  every  cor- 
ner. There  is  another  type  of  courage  based  on  the 
philosophy  that  to  lose  control  of  oneself  is  the  great- 
est disaster.  There  are  the  nobly  proud,  whose  con- 
ception of  "  ought,"  of  "  noMesse  oblige/'  makes  them 
the  real  aristocrats  of  the  race. 

The  fierce,  the  predisposed  to  anger  are  usually  cour- 
ageous. Unrestrained  anger  tends  to  break  down  im- 
agination and  foresight;  caution  disappears  and  the 
smallest  will  attack  the  largest.  In  racial  propaganda, 
one  way  to  arouse  courage  is  to  arouse  anger.    The 


198  THE  FOUNDATIONS  OF  PERSONALITY 

enemy  is  represented  as  all  that  is  despicable  and  mean 
and  as  threatening  the  women  and  children,  religion,  or 
the  flag.  It  is  not  sufficient  to  arouse  hate,  for  hate 
may  fear.  While  individuals  of  a  fierce  type  may  be 
cowards,  and  the  gentle  often  enough  are  heroes,  the 
history  of  the  race  shows  that  physical  courage  resides 
more  with  the  fierce  races  than  with  the  gentle. 

Those  who  feel  themselves  superior  in  strength  and 
energy  are  much  more  apt  to  be  courageous  than  those 
who  feel  themselves  inferior.  In  fact,  the  latter  have 
to  force  themselves  to  courage,  whereas  the  former's 
courage  is  spontaneous.  Men  do  not  fear  to  be  alone 
in  a  house  as  women  do,  largely  because  men  feel  them- 
selves equal  to  coping  with  intruders,  who  are  sure  to 
be  men,  while  women  do  not.  One  of  the  early  signs 
of  chronic  sickness  is  a  feeling  of  fear,  a  loss  of  courage, 
based  on  a  feeling  of  inferiority  to  emergencies.  The 
Spartans  made  it  part  of  that  development  of  courage 
for  which  their  name  stands,  to  develop  the  physique  of 
both  their  men  and  women.  Their  example,  in  rational 
measure,  should  be  followed  by  all  education,  for  cour- 
age is  essential  to  nobility  of  character.  I  emphasize 
that  such  training  should  be  extended  to  both  male 
and  female,  for  we  cannot  expect  to  have  a  timorous 
mother  efficiently  educate  her  boy  to  be  brave,  to  say 
nothing  of  the  fact  that  her  own  happiness  and  effi- 
ciency rest  on  courage. 

Tradition  is  a  mighty  factor  in  the  production  of 
courage.  To  feel  that  something  is  expected  of  one 
because  one's  ancestors  lived  up  to  a  high  standard  be- 
comes a  guiding  feeling  in  life.  Not  to  be  inferior,  not 
to  disappoint  expectation,  to  maintain  the  tradition  that 
a  "  So-and-So  "  never  shows  the  white  feather,  makes 
heroes  of  the  soldiers  of  famous  regiments,  of  firemen 


COURAGE,  RESIGNATION  AND  PATIENCE  199 

and  policemen,  of  priests,  of  the  scions  of  distinguished 
families,  aye,  even  of  races.  To  every  man  in  the  grip 
of  a  glorious  tradition  it  seems  as  if  those  back  of  him 
are  not  really  dead,  as  if  they  stand  with  him,  and  speak 
with  his  voice  and  act  in  his  deeds.  The  doctor  who 
knows  of  the  martyrs  of  his  profession  and  knows  that 
in  the  code  of  his  calling  there  are  no  diseases  he  must 
hesitate  to  face,  goes  with  equanimity  where  others  who 
are  braver  in  facing  death  of  other  kinds  do  not  dare 
to  enter. 

Courage  is  competitive,  courage  is  cooperative,  as  is 
every  other  phase  of  the  mental  life  of  men.  We  gather 
courage  as  we  watch  a  fellow  worker  face  his  danger 
with  a  brave  spirit,  for  we  will  not  be  outdone.  Amour 
propre  will  not  permit  us  to  cringe  or  give  in,  though 
we  are  weary  to  death  of  a  struggle.  But  also  we  thrill 
with  a  common  feeling  at  the  sight  of  the  hero  holding 
his  own,  we  are  enthused  by  it,  we  wish  to  be  with  him ; 
and  his  shining  example  moves  us  to  a  fellowship  in 
courage.  We  find  courage  in  the  belief  that  others 
are  "  with  us,"  whether  that  courage  faces  physical  or 
moral  danger.  To  be  "  with  "  a  man  is  to  more  than 
double  his  resources  of  strength,  intelligence  and  cour- 
age ;  it  is  more  than  an  addition,  for  it  multiplies  all  his 
virtues  and  eliminates  his  defects.  The  sum  total  is  the 
Hero.  I  wonder  if  there  really  ever  has  been  a  truly 
lonely  hero,  if  always  there  has  not  been  some  one  who 
said,  "  I  have  faith  in  you ;  I  am  with  you !  "  If  a  man 
has  lacked  human  backing,  he  has  said  to  himself,  "  The 
Highest  of  all  is  with  me,  though  I  seem  to  stand  alone. 
God  gives  me  courage !  " 

In  a  profoundly  intellectual  way,  courage  depends  on 
a  feeling  that  one  is  useful,  not  futile.  Men  lose  cour- 
age, in  the  sense  of  brave  and  determined  effort,  when 


200  THE  FOUNDATIONS  OF  PERSONALITY 

it  seems  as  if  progress  has  ceased  and  their  place  in 
the  world  has  disappeared.  This  one  sees  frequently 
in  middle-aged  men,  who  find  themselves  relegated  to 
secondary  places  by  younger  men,  who  feel  that  they 
are  slipping  and  soon  will  be  dependents. 

Hope,  the  foreseeing  of  a  possible  success,  is  neces- 
sary for  most  courage,  though  now  and  then  despair 
acts  with  a  courage  that  is  largely  pride.  The  idea  of 
a  future  world  has  given  more  courage  to  man  in  his 
difficulties  than  all  other  conceptions  together,  for  the 
essence  of  the  belief  in  immortality  is  to  transfer  hope 
and  success  from  the  tangle  of  this  world  to  the  clear, 
untroubled  heavenly  other  world. 

2.  Here  we  must  consider  other,  related  qualities. 
The  office  of  intelligence  is  to  adjust  man  to  a  complex 
world,  to  furnish  pathways  to  a  goal  which  instinct  per- 
haps chooses.  Suppose  a  goal  reached,  —  say  marriage 
is  entered  upon  with  the  one  that  we  think  is  to  give 
us  that  satisfaction  and  happiness  we  long  for.  The 
marriage  does  not  so  result,  either  because  we  have 
expected  too  much,  or  because  the  partner  falls  below 
a  reasonable  expectation,  or  because  contradictory  ele- 
ments in  the  natures  of  the  wedded  pair  cannot  be 
reconciled.  Unity  is  not  reached;  disunion  results,  al- 
most, let  us  say,  from  the  very  start.    What  happens? 

Many  adjustments  may  take  place.  A  crude  one  is 
that  the  pair,  after  much  quarreling,  decide  to  separate 
or  become  divorced,  or  on  a  still  cruder,  ignoble  level, 
one  or  the  other  runs  away,  deserts  the  family.  A  com- 
mon adjustment,  of  an  anti-social  kind,  forms  the  basis 
of  much  of  modern  and  ancient  literature ;  the  partners 
seek  compensation  elsewhere,  enter  into  illicit  love  af- 
fairs and  maintain  a  dual  existence  which  rarely  is 


COURAGE,  RESIGNATION  AND  PATIENCE  201 

peaceful  or  happy.  Indeed,  the  nature  of  the  situation, 
with  outraged  conscience  and  fear  of  exposure,  prevents 
happiness. 

But  there  are  those  who  in  such  a  situation  do  what 
is  known  as  "  make  the  best  of  it."  They  avoid  quar- 
rels, they  keep  up  the  pretense  of  affection,  they  seek  to 
discover  the  good  qualities  in  the  mate ;  they  are,  as  we 
say,  resigned  to  the  situation.  To  be  resigned  is  to 
accept  an  evil  with  calmness  and  equanimity,  but  with- 
out energy.  Resignation  and  courage  are  closely  re- 
lated, though  the  former  is  a  rather  pallid  member  of 
the  family.  The  poor  and  the  miserable  everywhere 
practise  this  virtue;  the  church  has  raised  it  perforce 
to  the  most  needed  of  qualities ;  it  is  a  sort  of  policy  of 
nonresistance  to  the  evils  of  the  world  and  one's  own 
lot. 

But  resignation  represents  only  one  type  of  legiti- 
mate adjustment,  of  sublimation.  By  sublimation  is 
meant  the  process  of  using  the  energy  of  a  repressed 
desire  and  purpose  for  some  "  higher  "  end.  Thus  in 
the  case  of  domestic  unhappiness  the  man  may  plunge 
himself  deeply  into  work  and  even  be  unconscious  of 
the  source  of  his  energy.  This  type  of  adjustment  is 
thus  a  form  of  compensation  and  is  seen  everywhere. 
In  the  case  of  many  a  woman  who  gives  herself  over  to 
her  children  without  stint  you  may  find  this  sublima- 
tion against  the  disappearance  of  romance,  even  if  no 
actual  unhappiness  exists.  Where  a  woman  is  childless, 
perforce  and  not. per  will,  an  intense  communal  activity 
often  develops,  leading  to  good  if  that  activity  is  intel- 
ligent, leading  to  harm  if  it  is  not.  For  sublimation 
develops  the  crank  and  pest  as  well  as  the  reformer. 
In  every  half-baked  reform  movement  you  find  those  who 


202  THE  FOUNDATIONS  OF  PERSONALITY 

are  striving  to  sublimate  for  a  thwarted  instinct  or 
purpose.^ 

Sublimation  is  the  mark  of  the  personality  that  will 
not  admit  defeat  even  to  itself.  The  one  who  does  admit 
defeat  becomes  resigned  or  seeks  illicit  compensation, — 
other  men,  other  women,  drink.  Freud  and  his  fol- 
lowers believe  that  the  neurasthenic  or  hysteric  is  striv- 
ing to  find  compensation  through  his  symptoms  or  that 
he  seeks  to  fly  from  the  situation  that  way.  I  believe 
that  the  symptoms  of  the  neurasthenic  and  hysteric 
often  find  a  use  in  this  way,  but  are  not  caused  by  an 
effort  for  compensation.  That  is,  a  neurasthenic  may 
learn  that  his  or  her  pains  or  aches  give  advantages  in 
sympathy,  relief  from  hard  tasks  or  disagreeable  situa- 
tions; that  they  cover  up  or  are  an  excuse  for  failure 
and  inferiority, —  but  the  symptoms  arise  originally 
from  defects  in  character  or  because  of  the  physical 
and  social  situation.  Nevertheless,  it  is  well  to  keep 
in  mind,  when  dealing  with  the  "  nervous,"  that  often 
enough  their  weaknesses  are  related  to  something  they 
may  gain  through  them.  This  I  have  called  elsewhere 
"  Will  to  power  through  weakness,"  and  it  is  as  old  as 
Adam  and  Eve.  The  weak  have  their  wills  and  their 
weapons  as  have  the  strong. 

The  highest  sublimation,  in  the  face  of  an  insuperable 
obstacle  to  purpose  or  an  inescapable  life  situation, 
finds  a  socially  useful  substitute  in  philanthropy,  kind- 
ness, charity,  achievement  of  all  sorts ;  the  lowest  seeks 
it  in  a  direct  but  illicit  compensation  for  the  self  and 
in  a  way  that  merely  increases  the  social  and  personal 
confusion;  and  a  pathological  sublimation  in  part,  at 
least,  manifests  itself  in  sickness.     These  are  the  three 

*The  historian,  Higginson,  put  it  well  when  he  said  substantially, 
"  There  is  a  fringe  of  insanity  around  all  reform." 


COURAGE,  RESIGNATION  AND  PATIENCE  203 

leading  forms,  but  it  must  be  remembered  that  there 
are  no  pure  types  in  character;  a  man  may  sublimate 
nobly  when  his  domestic  happiness  is  threatened  but 
cheat  when  his  business  purposes  are  blocked ;  a  woman 
may  compensate  finely  for  childlessness  but  "  go  all  to 
pieces  "  because  hair  is  growing  on  her  face  and  the 
beauty  she  cherishes  must  go.  Contradictions  of  all 
sorts  exist,  and  he  is  wise  who  does  not  expect  too  great 
consistency  from  himself  or  others. 

3.  "  Man,"  says  Hocking,  "  can  prolong  the  vestibule 
of  his  desire  through  infinity."  By  the  vestibule  of  de- 
sire this  philosopher  means  the  deferring  of  satisfaction 
for  any  impulse  or  desire.  We  love,  but  we  can  wait 
for  love's  fulfillment;  we  desire  achievement,  but  we 
can  work  and  watch  the  approach  of  our  goal.  Some- 
thing we  desire  is  directly  ahead,  almost  in  our  reach, — 
fame,  love,  riches,  vindication,  anything  you  please  from 
the  sensuous  to  the  sublime  satisfaction;  and  then  an 
obstacle,  a  delay,  appears,  and  the  vestibule  is  length- 
ened out.  A  man  may  even  plan  for  the  satisfaction 
he  can  never  hope  to  have,  and  in  his  greatest  ideal 
that  vestibule  reaches  through  eternity. 

That  quality  which  enables  a  man  to  work  and  wait, 
to  stand  the  deferring  of  hope  and  desire,  is  patience. 
The  classic  figure  of  patience  sitting  on  a  monument  is 
wrong,  for  she  must  sit  on  the  eager  desires  of  man. 
Nor  is  patience  only  the  virtue  of  the  good  and  far- 
seeing,  for  we  find  patience  in  the  rogue  and  schemer. 
Altruists  may  be  patient  or  impatient,  and  so  may  be 
the  selfish.  Like  most  of  the  qualities,  patience  is  to 
be  judged  by  the  company  it  keeps. 

Nevertheless,  the  impatient  are  very  often  those  of 
small  purposes  and  are  rarely  those  of  great  achieve- 
ment.   For  all  great  purposes  have  to  be  spread  over 


204  THE  FOUNDATIONS  OF  PERSONALITY 

time,  have  to  overcome  obstacles,  and  these  must  be 
met  with  courage  and  patience.  Impatience  is  fussi- 
ness,  fretfulness  and  a  prime  breeder  of  neurasthenia. 
Patience  is  realistic,  and  though  it  may  seek  perfection 
it  puts  up  with  imperfection  as  a  part  of  human  life. 
But  here  I  am  drifting  into  an  error  against  which  I 
warned  the  reader, —  of  making  an  entity  of  a  con- 
ception. People  are  patient  or  impatient,  but  not  neces- 
sarily throughout.  There  are  men  and  women  who 
fuss  and  fume  over  trifles  who  never  falter  or  fret  when 
their  larger  purposes  are  blocked  or  deferred.  Some 
cannot  stand  detail  who  plan  wisely  and  with  patience. 
Vice  versa,  there  are  meticulous  folk,  little  people, 
whose  petty  obstacles  are  met  with  patience  and  cheer- 
fulness, who  revel  in  minute  detail,  but  who  want  re- 
turns soon  and  cannot  wait  a  long  time.  We  are  not 
to  ask  of  any  man  whether  he  is  patient  but  rather  what 
does  he  stand  or  do  patiently?  What  renders  him  im- 
patient? 

A  form  of  impatience  of  enormous  social  importance 
is  that  which  manifests  itself  in  cure-alls.  A  man  finds 
that  his  Will  overcomes  some  obstacles.  Eager  to  apply 
this,  he  announces  that  will  cures  all  ills.  Impatient  of 
evil,  men  seek  to  annihilate  it  by  denying  its  existence 
or  by  loudly  chanting  that  good  thoughts  will  destroy 
it.  These  are  typical  impatient  solutions  in  the  sphere 
of  religion ;  in  the  sphere  of  economics  men  urge  nation- 
alization, free  trade,  socialism  or  laissez  faire,  or  some 
law  or  other  to  change  social  structure  and  human 
nature.  War  itself  is  the  most  impatient  and  conse- 
quently most  socially  destructive  method  of  the  methods 
of  the  treatment  of  evil. 

While  patience  is  a  virtue,  it  may  also  be  a  vice.  One 
may  bear  wrongs  too  patiently  or  defer  satisfaction  too 


COURAGE,  RESIGNATION  AND  PATIENCE  205 

long.  One  meets  every  day  men  and  women  who  help 
injustice  and  iniquity  by  their  patience.  We  are  too 
patient,  at  least  with  the  wrongs  of  others ;  perhaps  we 
really  do  not  feel  this  intensely  or  for  any  length  of 
time.  In  fact,  the  difficulty  with  most  of  the  preach- 
ing of  life  is  its  essential  insincerity,  for  it  counsels 
patience  for  that  which  it  feels  but  little.  We  bear  the 
troubles  of  others,  on  the  whole,  very  well.  Neverthe- 
less, there  are  Griseldas  everywhere  whom  one  would 
respect  far  more  if  they  rebelled  against  their  tyrants 
and  taskmasters.  Organized  wrong  and  oppression  owe 
their  existence  mainly  to  the  habitual  patience  of  the 
oppressed.  To  be  meek  and  mild  and  long-suffering  in  a 
world  containing  plenty  of  egoists  and  cannibalistic 
types  is  to  give  them  supremacy.^  We  admire  patience 
only  when  it  is  part  of  a  plan  of  action,  not  when  it 
is  the  mark  of  a  passive  nature. 

4.  Because  man  foresees  he  wishes.  Rather  than  the 
reasoning  animal,  we  might  speak  of  the  human  being 
as  the  wishing  animal.  An  automatically  working  in- 
stinct would  produce  no  wish.  The  image  of  some- 
thing which  has  been  experienced  arouses  an  excitement 
akin  to  the  secretion  of  saliva  at  the  thought  of  food. 
The  wish  which  accompanies  the  excitement  is  a  dis- 
satisfaction, a  tingling,  an  incomplete  pleasurable  emo- 
tional state  which  presses  to  action.  Sensuous  pleas- 
ure, power,  conformity  to  the  ideal,  whatever  direction 
the  wish  takes,  are  sought  because  of  the  wish.  Right 
education  is  to  train  towards  right  wishing. 

Because  the  wish  is  the  prelude  to  action,  it  became 
all  powerful  in  mythology  and  superstition.  Certain 
things  would  help  you  get  your  wishes,  others  would 

*  Here  the  ideals  of  East  and  West  clash.  The  East,  bearing  a  huge 
burden  of  misery  and  essentially  pessimistic,  exhorts  patience.  The 
West,  eager  and  full  of  hope,  is  impatient. 


206  THE  FOUNDATIONS  OF  PERSONALITY 

obstruct  them.  Wishes  became  animate  and  had  power, 
—  power  to  destroy  an  enemy,  power  to  help  a  friend, 
power  to  bring  good  to  yourself.  But  certain  cere- 
monies had  to  be  observed,  and  certain  people,  magi- 
cians and  priests  had  to  be  utilized  in  order  to  give  the 
wish  its  power.  Wisdom  and  magic  were  mainly  the 
ways  of  obtaining  wishes.  Childhood  still  holds  to  this, 
and  prayer  is  a  faith  that  your  wish,  if  placed  before 
the  All-Mighty,  will  be  fulfilled. 

Since  wishing  brings  a  pleasurable  excitement,  it  has 
its  dangers,  in  the  daydream  where  wishes  are  fulfilled 
without  effort.  Power,  glory,  beauty  and  admiration 
are  obtained;  the  ugly  Duckling  becomes  the  Swan, 
Cinderella  becomes  the  Princess,  Jack  kills  the  Giant 
and  is  honored  by  all  men ;  the  girl  becomes  the  beauty 
and  heroine  of  romance;  the  boy  becomes  the  Hero, 
taking  over  power,  wealth  and  beauty  as  his  due.  The 
world  of  romance  is  largely  the  wish-world,  as  is  the 
most  of  the  stage.  The  happy  ending  is  our  wish-ful- 
fillment, and  only  the  sophisticated  and  highly  cultured 
object  to  it.  Moulding  the  world  to  the  heart's  desire 
has  been  the  principal  business  of  stage,  novel  and  song. 

In  the  normal  relations  of  life,  the  wish  is  the  begin- 
ning of  will,  as  something  definitely  related  to  a  future 
goal.  He  who  wishes  finds  his  way  to  planning  and  to 
patient  endeavor,  if  training,  circumstances  and  essen- 
tial character  meet.  To  wish  much  is  the  first  step  in 
acquiring  much, —  but  only  the  first  step.  For  many  it 
is  almost  the  only  step,  and  in  the  popular  phrase  these 
have  a  "  wishbone  in  the  place  of  a  backbone."  They 
are  the  daydreamers,  the  inveterate  readers  of  novels, 
who  carry  into  adult  life  what  is  relatively  normal  in 
the  child.  The  introspective  are  this  latter  type ;  rarely 
indeed  do  the  objective  personalities  spend  much  time 


COURAGE,  RESIGNATION  AND  PATIENCE  207 

in  wishing.  Undoubtedly  it  is  from  the  introspective 
that  the  wish  as  a  symbol  and  worker  of  power  gained 
its  influence  and  meaning.  This  transformation  of  the 
wish  to  a  power  is  found  in  all  primitive  thought,  in  the 
power  of  the  blessing  and  the  curse,  in  the  delusions  of 
certain  of  the  insane  who  build  up  the  belief  in  their 
greatness  out  of  the  wish  to  be  great ;  and  in  our  days 
New  Thought  and  kindred  beliefs  are  modernized  forms 
of  this  ancient  fallacy. 

It  is  a  comforting  thought  to  those  who  seek  an  opti- 
mistic point  of  view  that  most  men  wish  to  do  right. 
Very  few,  indeed,  deliberately  wish  to  do  wrong.  But 
the  difficulty  lies  in  this,  that  this  wish  to  do  right 
camouflages  all  their  wishes,  no  matter  what  their  es- 
sential character.  Thus  the  contestants  on  either  side 
of  any  controversy  color  as  right  their  opposing  wishes, 
and  cruelties  even  if  they  bum  people  at  the  stake  for 
heresy,  kill  and  ruin,  degrade  and  cheat,  lie  and  steal. 
Thus  has  arisen  the  dictum,  "  The  end  justifies  the 
means."  The  good  desired  hallows  the  methods  used, 
and  all  kinds  of  evil  have  resulted.  Practical  wisdom  be- 
lieves that  up  to  a  certain  point  you  must  seek  your  pur- 
pose with  all  the  methods  at  hand.  But  the  temptation 
to  go  farther  always  operates ;  a  man  starts  to  do  some- 
thing a  little  underhanded  in  behalf  of  his  noble  wish  and 
finds  himself  committed  to  conduct  unqualifiedly  evil. 

5.  There  are  certain  other  emotional  states  associated 
with  energy  and  the  energy  feeling  of  great  interest. 
What  we  call  eagerness,  enthusiasm,  passion,  refers  to 
the  intensity  of  an  instinct,  wish,  desire  or  purpose.  In 
childhood  this  energy  is  quite  striking;  it  is  one  of  the 
great  charms  of  childhood  and  is  a  trait  all  adults  envy. 
For  it  is  the  disappearance  of  passion,  eagerness  and 
enthusiasm  that  is  the  tragedy  of  old  age  and  which 


208  THE  FOUNDATIONS  OF  PERSONALITY 

really  constitutes  getting  old.  Youth  anticipates  with 
eagerness  and  relishes  with  keen  satisfaction.  The  en- 
thusiasm of  typical  youth  is  easily  aroused  and  sweeps 
it  on  to  action,  a  feature  called  impulsiveness.  Sym- 
pathy, pity,  hope,  sex  feeling  —  all  the  self -feelings  and 
all  the  other  feelings  —  are  at  once  more  lively  and 
more  demonstrative  in  youth,  and  thus  it  is  that  in 
youth  the  reform  spirit  is  at  its  height  and  recedes  as 
time  goes  on.  What  we  call  "  experience  "  chills  en- 
thusiasm and  passion,  but  though  hope  deferred  and  a 
realization  of  the  complexity  of  human  affairs  has  a 
moderating,  inhibiting  result,  there  is  as  much  or  more 
importance  to  be  attached  to  bodily  changes.  If  you 
could  attach  to  the  old  man's  experience  and  knowledge 
the  body  of  youth,  with  its  fresher  arteries,  more  resili- 
ent muscles  and  joints,  its  exuberant  glands  and  fresh 
bodily  juices, —  desire,  passion,  enthusiasm  would  re- 
turn. In  the  chemistry  of  life,  passion  and  enthusiasm 
arise;  sickness,  fatigue,  experience  and  time  are  their 
antagonists. 

This  is  not  to  deny  that  these  energy  manifestations 
can  be  aroused  from  the  outside.  That  is  the  purpose 
of  teaching  and  preaching;  the  purpose  of  writer  and 
orator.  There  is  a  social  spread  of  enthusiasm  that  is 
the  most  marked  feature  of  crowds  and  assemblies,  and 
this  eagerness  makes  a  unit  of  thousands  of  diverse  per- 
sonalities. Further,  the  problem  of  awakening  enthusi- 
asm and  desire  is  the  therapeutic  problem  of  the  physi- 
cian and  especially  in  the  condition  described  as 
anhedonia. 

In  anhedonia,  as  first  described  by  Ribot,  mentioned 
by  James,  and  which  has  recently  been  worked  up  by 
myself  as  a  group  of  symptoms  in  mental  and  nervous 
disease,  as  well  as  in  life  in  general,  there  is  a  char- 


COURAGE,  RESIGNATION  AND  PATIENCE  209 

acteristic  lack  of  enthusiasm  in  anticipation  and  reali- 
zation, a  lack  of  appetite  and  desire,  a  lack  of  satis- 
faction. Nothing  appeals,  and  the  values  drop  out  of 
existence.  The  victims  of  anhedonia  at  first  pass  from 
one  "  pleasure  "  to  another,  hoping  each  will  please  and 
satisfy,  but  it  does  not.  Food,  drink,  work,  play,  sex, 
music,  art, —  all  have  lost  their  savor.  Restless,  intro- 
spective, with  a  feeling  of  unreality  gripping  at  his 
heart,  the  patient  finds  himself  confronting  a  world  that 
has  lost  meaning  because  it  has  lost  enthusiasm  in  desire 
and  satisfaction. 

How  does  this  unhappy  state  arise?  In  the  first 
place,  from  the  very  start  of  life  people  differ  in  the 
quality  of  eagerness.  There  is  a  wide  variability  in 
these  qualities.  Of  two  infants  one  will  call  lustily 
for  whatever  he  wants,  show  great  glee  in  anticipating, 
great  eagerness  in  seeking,  and  a  high  degree  of  satis- 
faction when  his  desire  is  gratified.  And  another  will 
be  lackadaisical  in  his  appetite,  whimsical,  "hard  to 
please "  and  much  more  difficult  to  keep  pleased. 
Fatigue  will  strip  the  second  child  of  the  capacity  to 
eat  and  sleep,  to  say  nothing  of  his  desires  for  social 
pleasures,  whereas  it  will  only  dampen  the  zeal  and 
eagerness  of  the  first  child.  There  is  a  hearty  simple 
type  of  person  who  is  naively  eager  and  enthusiastic, 
full  of  desire,  passion  and  enthusiasm,  who  finds  joy 
and  satisfaction  in  simple  things,  whose  purposes  do 
not  grow  stale  or  monotonous;  there  is  a  finicky  type, 
easily  displeased  and  dissatisfied,  laying  weight  on 
trifles,  easily  made  anhedonic,  victims  of  any  reduction 
in  their  own  energy  (which  is  on  the  whole  low)  or  of 
any  disagreeable  event.  True,  these  sensitive  folk  are 
creators  of  beauty  and  the  esthetic,  but  also  they  are 
the  victims  of  the  malady  we  are  here  discussing. 


210  THE  FOUNDATIONS  OF  PEKSONALITY 

Aside  from  this  temperament,  training  plays  its  part. 
I  think  it  a  crime  against  childhood  to  make  its  joys 
complex  or  sophisticated.  Too  much  adult  company 
and  adult  amusements  are  destructive  of  desire  and 
satisfaction  to  the  child.  A  boy  or  girl  whose  wishes 
are  at  once  gratified  gets  none  of  the  pleasure  of  effort 
and  misses  one  of  the  essential  lessons  of  life.  —  that 
pleasure  and  satisfaction  must  come  from  the  chase 
and  not  from  the  quarry,  from  the  struggle  and  effort 
as  well  as  from  the  goal.  Montaigne,  that  wise  skeptic, 
lays  much  homely  emphasis  on  this,  as  indeed  all  wise 
men  do.  But  too  great  a  struggle,  too  desperate  an 
effort,  exhausts,  and  as  a  runner  lies  panting  and  mo- 
tionless at  the  tape,  so  we  all  have  seen  men  reach  a 
desired  place  after  untold  privation  and  sacrifice  and 
who  then  found  that  there  seemed  to  be  no  energy,  no 
zeal  or  desire,  no  satisfaction  left  for  them.  The  too 
eager  and  enthusiastic  are  exposed,  like  all  the  over- 
emotional,  to  great  recessions,  great  ebbs,  in  the  volume 
of  their  feeling  and  feel  for  a  time  the  direst  pain  in 
all  experience,  the  death  in  life  of  anhedonia. 

After  an  illness,  particularly  influenza,  when  recov- 
ery has  seemingly  taken  place,  there  develops  a  lack 
of  energy  feeling  and  the  whole  syndrome  of  anhedonia 
which  lasts  until  the  subtle  damage  done  by  the  disease 
passes  off.  Half  or  more  of  the  "  nervousness  "  in  the 
world  is  based  on  actual  physical  trouble,  and  the  rest 
relates  to  temperament. 

When  a  great  purpose  or  desire  has  been  built  up, 
has  drained  all  the  enthusiasm  of  the  individual  and 
then  suddenly  becomes  blocked,  as  in  a  love  affair,  op 
when  a  business  is  threatened  or  crashes  or  when  beauty 
starts  to  leave,  —  then  one  sees  the  syndrome  of  anhe- 
donia in  essential  purity.    A  great  fear,  or  an  obsessive 


COURAGE,  RESIGNATION  AND  PATIENCE  211 

moral  struggle  (as  when  one  fights  hopelessly  against 
temptation),  has  the  same  effect.  The  enthusiasm  of 
purpose  and  the  eagerness  of  appetite  go  at  once,  in 
certain  delicate  people,  when  pride  is  seriously  injured 
t)r  when  a  once  established  superiority  is  crumbled. 
The  humiliated  man  is  anhedonic,  even  if  he  is  a  philoso- 
pher. 

The  most  striking  cases  are  seen  in  men  who  have 
been  swung  from  humdrum  existence  to  the  exciting, 
disagreeable  life  of  war  and  then  back  to  their  former 
life.  The  former  task  cannot  be  taken  up  or  is  carried 
on  with  great  effort ;  the  zest  of  things  has  disappeared, 
and  what  was  so  longed  for  while  in  the  service  seems 
flat  and  stale,  especially  if  it  is  now  realized  that  there 
are  far  more  interesting  fields  of  effort.  In  a  lesser 
degree,  the  romances  that  girls  feed  on  unfit  them  for 
sober  realities,  and  the  expectation  of  marriage  built 
up  by  romantic  novel  and  theater  do  far  more  harm 
than  good.  The  triangle  play  or  story  is  less  mischiev- 
ous than  the  one  which  paints  married  life  as  an  amor- 
ous glow. 

One  could  write  a  volume  on  eagerness,  enthusiasm 
and  passion,  satisfaction  and  dissatisfaction.  Life,  to 
be  worth  the  living,  must  have  its  enthusiasms,  must 
swing  constantly  from  desire  to  satisfaction,  or  else 
seems  void  and  painful.  Great  purposes  are  the  surest 
to  maintain  enthusiasm,  little  purposes  become  flat.  He 
who  hitches  his  wagon  to  a  star  must  risk  indeed,  but 
there  is  a  thrill  to  his  life  outweighing  the  joy  of  minor 
success. 

To  reenthuse  the  apathetic  is  an  individual  problem. 
When  the  lowered  pressure  of  the  energy  feeling  is  phys- 
ical in  origin,  then  rest  and  exercise,  massage  hydro- 
therapy, medicines  (especially  the  bitter  tonics),  change 


212  THE  FOUNDATIONS  OF  PERSONALITY 

of  scene  are  valuable.  And  even  where  the  cause  is 
not  in  illness,  these  procedures  have  great  value  for  in 
stimulating  the  organism  the  function  of  enthusiasm  is 
recharged.  But  one  does  not  neglect  the  value  of  new 
hopes,  new  interests,  friendship,  physical  pleasure  and 
above  all  a  new  philosophy,  a  philosophy  based  on  re- 
adjustment and  the  nobility  of  struggle.  Not  all  peo- 
ple can  thus  be  reached,  for  in  some,  perhaps  many 
cases,  the  loss  of  these  desires  is  the  beginning  of  men- 
tal disease,  but  patient  effort  and  intelligent  sympa- 
thetic understanding  still  work  their  miracles. 


CHAPTER  XI 

THE  EVOLUTION  OF  CHARACTER  WITH  ESPECIAL  REFERENCE 
TO  THE  GROWTH  OF  PURPOSE   AND  PERSONALITY 

There  have  been  various  philosophies  dealing  with 
the  purposes  of  man.  Man  seeks  this  or  that  —  the 
eternal  good,  beauty,  happiness,  pleasure,  survival  — 
but  always  he  is  represented  as  a  seeker.  A  very  popu- 
lar doctrine.  Hedonism,  now  somewhat  in  disfavor,  rep- 
resents him  as  seeking  pleasurable,  affective  states.  The 
diflflculty  of  understanding  the  essential  nature  of  pleas- 
ure and  pain,  the  fact  that  what  is  pleasure  to  one 
man  is  pain  to  another,  rather  discredited  this  as  a 
psychological  explanation.  I  think  we  may  phrase  the 
situation  fairly  on  an  empirical  basis  when  we  say  that 
seeking  arises  in  instinct  but  receives  its  impulse  to 
continuity  by  some  agreeable  affective  state  of  satisfac- 
tion. Man  steers  towards  pleasure  and  satisfaction  of 
some  type  or  other,  but  the  force  is  the  unbalance  of  an 
instinct. 

When  we  speak  of  man  as  a  seeker,  we  are  not  sep- 
arating him  from  the  rest  of  living  things.  All  life 
seeks,  and  the  more  mobile  a  living  thing  is  the  more  it 
seeks.  A  sessile  mussel  chained  to  a  rock  seeks  little 
but  the  fundamentals  of  nutrition  and  generation  and 
these  in  a  simple  way.  An  animal  that  builds  habita- 
tions for  its  young,  courts  its  mate,  plays,  teaches  and 
fights,  may  do  nothing  more  than  seek  nutrition  and  gen- 
eration, but  it  seeks  these  through  many  intermediary 
"  end  "  points,  through  many  impulses,  and  thus  it  has 


214  THE  FOUNDATIONS  OF  PERSONALITY 

many  types  of  satisfaction.  When  a  creature  develops 
to  the  point  that  it  establishes  all  kinds  of  rules  gov- 
erning conduct,  when  it  establishes  sanctions  that  are 
eternal  and  has  purposes  that  have  a  terminus  in  a 
hereafter  which  is  out  of  the  span  of  life  of  the  planner, 
it  becomes  quite  difficult  to  say  just  what  it  is  man  seeks. 
In  fact,  every  man  seeks  many  things,  many  satisfac- 
tions, and  whatever  it  may  be  that  Man  in  the  abstract 
seeks,  individual  men  differ  very  decidedly  not  only  as 
to  what  they  seek  but  as  to  what  should  be  sought. 

Our  viscera,  our  tissues,  as  they  function,  change  by 
the  using  up  of  energy  and  the  breaking  down  of  ma- 
terials. That  change  brings  about  sensory  disturbances 
in  our  body  which  are  not  unpleasant  in  moderation, 
which  we  call  hunger,  thirst  and  fatigue.  To  relieve 
these  three  primitive  states  we  seek  food,  drink  and 
rest;  we  desire  food,  drink  and  rest.  Desire  then  is 
primitive,  organic,  arising  mainly  in  the  vegetative 
nervous  system,  and  it  awakens  mechanisms  that  bring 
us  food,  drink  and  rest.  A  feeling  which  we  call  sat- 
isfaction results  when  the  changes  in  the  viscera  and  tis- 
sues are  readjusted  or  on  the  way  to  readjustment. 
Here  is  the  simplest  paradigm  for  desire  seeking  sat- 
isfaction, but  it  is  on  a  plane  rarely  found  in  man, 
because  his  life  is  too  complicated  for  such  formulae 
to  work. 

Food  must  be  bought  or  produced,  and  this  involves 
cooperation,  competition,  self-denial,  thrift,  science, 
finance,  invention.  It  involves  ethics,  because  though 
you  are  hungry  you  must  not  steal  food  or  give  im- 
proper value  for  it.  Moreover,  though  you  are  hungry, 
you  have  developed  tastes,  manners,  etc.,  and  you  can- 
not, must  not  eat  this  or  that  (through  religion) ;  you 
must  eat  with  certain  implements,  and  would  rather 


THE  EVOLUTION  OF  CHARACTER        215 

die  than  violate  the  established  standards  in  such  mat- 
ters.^ Thus  to  the  simple  act  of  eating,  to  the  satis- 
faction of  a  primitive  desire  set  up  by  a  primitive  need, 
there  are  any  number  of  obstacles  set  up  by  the  com- 
plexities of  our  social  existence.  The  sanction  of  these 
obstacles,  their  power  to  influence  us,  rests  in  other 
desires  and  purposes  arising  out  of  other  "  needs  "  of 
our  nature.  What  are  those  needs?  They  are  inherent 
in  what  has  been  called  the  social  instincts,  in  that 
side  of  our  nature  which  makes  us  yearn  for  approval 
and  swings  us  into  conformity  with  a  group.  The 
group  organizes  the  activities  of  its  individuals  just  as 
an  individual  organizes  his  activities.  The  evolution- 
ists explain  this  group  feeling  as  part  of  the  equipment 
necessary  for  survival.  Perhaps  this  is  an  adequate 
account  of  the  situation,  but  the  strength  of  the  social 
instincts  almost  lead  one  to  a  more  mystical  explana- 
tion, a  sort  of  acceptance  of  the  group  as  the  unit  and 
the  individual  as  an  incomplete  fragment. 

What  is  true  of  hunger  is  true  of  thirst  and  fatigue. 
Desires  in  these  directions  have  to  accommodate  them- 
selves, in  greater  or  lesser  degrees,  to  the  complexities 
in  which  our  social  nature  and  customs  have  involved 
us.  It  is  true  that  desires  upon  which  the  actual  sur- 
vival of  the  individual  depend  will  finally  break  through 
taboo  and  restriction  if  completely  balked.  That  is, 
very  few  people  will  actually  starve  to  death,  die  of 
thirst  or  keep  awake  indefinitely,  despite  any  conven- 
tion or  taboo.  Nevertheless  there  are  people  who  will 
resist  these  fundamental  desires,  as  in  the  case  of  Mac- 
Swiney,  the  Irish  republican,  and  as  in  the  case  of 
martyrs  recorded  in  the  history  of  all  peoples.     It  may 

*The  Sepoy  Rebellion  had  its  roots  in  a  food  taboo,  and  Mussulman, 
Hebrew  and  Roman  Catholic  place  a  religious  value  on  diet.  Most  of 
the  complexities  of  existence  are  of  our  own  creation. 


216  THE  FOUNDATIONS  OF  PERSONALITY 

be  that  in  some  of  these  we  are  dealing  with  a  powerful 
inhibition  of  appetite  of  the  kind  seen  in  anhedonia. 

The  elaboration  of  the  sex  impulses  and  desires  into 
the  purposes  of  marriage,  the  repression  into  lifelong 
continence  and  chastity,  forms  one  of  the  most  marvel- 
ous of  chapters  in  the  psychological  history  of  man. 
The  desire  for  sex  relationship  of  the  crude  kind  is 
very  variable  both  in  force,  time  of  appearance  and 
reaction  to  discipline  and  unquestionably  arises  from 
the  changes  in  the  sex  organs.  Both  to  enhance  and 
repress  it  are  aims  of  the  culture  and  custom  of  each 
group,  and  the  lower  groups  have  given  actual  sexual 
intercourse  a  mystical  supernatural  value  that  has  at 
times  and  in  various  places  raised  it  into  the  basis  of 
cults  and  religions.  Repressed,  hampered,  canalized, 
forbidden,  the  sex  impulses  have  profoundly  modified 
clothes,  art,  religion,  morals  and  philosophy.  The  sex 
customs  of  any  nation  demonstrate  the  extreme  plas- 
ticity of  human  desires  and  the  various  twists,  turns 
and  customs  that  tradition  declares  holy.  There  have 
been  whole  groups  of  people  that  have  deemed  any  sex- 
ual pleasure  unholy,  and  the  great  religions  still  deem 
it  necessary  for  their  leaders  to  be  continent.  And  the 
absurdities  of  modesty,  a  modified  sex  impulse,  have 
made  it  immoral  for  a  woman  to  show  her  leg  above 
the  calf  while  in  her  street  clothes,^  though  she  may 
wear  a  bathing  suit  without  reproach. 

Whatever  a  desire  is  basically,  it  tends  quickly  to  or- 
ganize itself  in  character.  It  gathers  to  itself  emotions, 
sentiments,  intelligence ;  it  plans  and  it  wills,  it  battles 
against  other  desires.  I  say  it,  as  if  the  desire  were  an 
entity,  a  personality,  but  what  I  mean  is  that  the  somatic 
and  cerebral  activities  of  a  desire  become  so  organized 

*  This  is,  of  course,  not  quite  so  true  in  1921  as  in  1910. 


THE  EVOLUTION  OF  CHARACTER       21T 

as  to  operate  as  a  unit.  A  permanent  excitability  of 
these  nervous  centers  as  a  unit  is  engendered,  and 
these  are  easily  aroused  either  by  a  stimulus  from  the 
body  or  from  without.  Thus  the  sex  impulse  arises  di- 
rectly from  tensions  within  the  sex  organs  but  is  built 
up  and  elaborated  by  approval  of  and  admiration  for 
beauty,  strength  and  intelligence,  by  the  desire  for  pos- 
session and  mastery,  by  competitive  feeling,  until  it  may 
become  drawn  out  into  the  elaborate  purpose  of  mar- 
riage or  the  family. 

What  is  the  ego  that  desires  and  plans?  I  do  not 
know,  but  if  it  is  in  any  part  a  metaphysical  entity  of 
permanent  nature  in  so  far  it  does  not  become  the  sub- 
ject matter  of  this  book.  For  as  a  metaphysical  entity 
it  is  uncontrollable,  and  the  object  of  science  is  to  dis- 
cover and  utilize  the  controllable  elements  of  the  world. 
I  may  point  out  that  even  those  philosophers  and  theol- 
ogians to  whom  the  ego  is  an  entity  of  supernatural 
origin  deny  their  own  standpoint  every  time  they  seek 
to  convince,  persuade  or  force  the  ego  of  some  one  to 
a  new  belief  or  new  line  of  action;  deny  it  every  time 
they  say,  "  I  am  tired  and  I  shall  rest ;  then  I  shall 
think  better  and  can  plan  better."  Such  a  philosopher 
says  in  essence,  "  I  have  an  entity  within  me  totally 
and  incommensurably  different  from  my  body,"  and 
then  he  goes  on  to  prove  that  this  entity  operates  better 
when  the  body  is  rested  and  fed  than  otherwise! 

For  us  the  ego  is  a  built-up  structure  and  has  its  evo- 
lution from  the  diffuse  state  of  early  infancy  to  the 
intense,  well-defined  state  of  maturity;  it  is  elaborated 
by  a  process  that  is  in  part  due  to  the  environment, 
in  part  to  the  inherent  structure  of  man.  We  may 
postulate  a  continuous  excitement  of  nerve  centers  as 
its  basis,  and  this  excitement  cognizes  other  excitement 


218  THE  FOUNDATIONS  OF  PERSONALITY 

in  some  mysterious  manner,  but  no  more  mysterious 
than  life,  instinct  or  intelligence  are.  These  excite- 
ments struggle  for  the  possession  of  an  outlet  in  action, 
and  this  is  what  we  call  competing  desires,  struggle 
against  temptation,  etc. 

Sometimes  one  desire  is  identified  with  the  ego  as 
part  of  itself,  sometimes  the  desire  is  contrasted  with 
the  ego  and  we  say,  "  I  struggled  with  the  desire  but  it 
overcame  me."  Common  language  plainly  shows  the 
plurality  of  the  personality,  even  though  the  man  on 
the  street  thinks  of  himself  as  a  united  "  I,"  even  an 
invisible  "  I." 

One  of  the  fundamental  desires,  nay  the  fundamental 
desire,  is  the  expansion  of  the  self,  i.  e.,  increased  self- 
esteem.  When  the  infant  sprawls  in  his  basket  after 
his  arrival  in  this  world,  it  is  doubtful  if  he  has  a  "  me  " 
which  he  separates  from  the  "  non-me."  Yet  that  same 
infant,  a  few  years  later,  and  through  the  rest  of  his 
life,  believes  that  in  his  personality  resides  something 
immortal,  and  has  as  his  prime  pleasure  the  feeling  of 
worth  and  growth  of  that  personality,  and  as  his  worst 
hurt  the  feeling  of  decay  and  inferiority  of  that  per- 
sonality. 

Let  us  watch  that  infant  as  it  sprawls  in  its  little 
bed,  the  darling  of  a  pair  of  worsliiping  parents.  In 
that  relationship  the  child  is  no  solitary  individual; 
society  is  there  already,  watching  him,  nourishing  and 
teaching  him.  Already  he  is  in  the  hands  of  his  group 
who,  though  seeking  his  happiness,  are  nevertheless 
determined  that  he  shall  obtain  it  their  way.  And  from 
then  to  the  end  of  his  life  that  group  will  in  large  meas- 
ure offer  him  the  criteria  of  values,  and  his  self-esteem 
will,  in  the  majority  of  cases,  rest  upon  his  idea  of  their 
esteem  of  him.     In  the  brooding  mother,  in  the  tender 


THE  EVOLUTION  OF  CHARACTER        219 

father  lie  dormant  all  the  judgments  of  the  time  on 
the  conduct  and  guiding  motives  of  the  little  one. 

The  baby  throws  his  arms  about,  kicks  his  legs,  rolls 
his  eyes.  In  these  movements  arising  from  internal  ac- 
tivities which,  we  can  only  state,  relate  to  vascular  dis- 
tribution, neuronic  relations,  visceral  and  endocrinic 
activities,  is  the  germ  of  the  impulse  to  activity  which 
it  is  the  function  of  society  and  the  individual  himself 
to  shape  into  organized  useful  work.  Thus  is  mani- 
fested a  native,  inherent,  potentiality,  which  we  may 
call  the  energy  of  the  baby,  the  energy  of  man,  a  some- 
thing which  the  environment  shapes,  but  which  is  cre- 
ated in  the  laboratory  of  the  individual.  The  father 
and  mother  are  delighted  with  the  fine  vigorous  move- 
ments of  the  child,  and  there  is  in  that  delight  the  ap- 
proval that  society  always  gives  or  tends  to  give  to 
manifestations  of  power.  We  tend  involuntarily  to  ad- 
mire strength,  even  though  misdirected.  The  strong 
man  always  has  followers  though  he  be  a  villain,  and 
in  fact  the  history  of  man  is  to  a  large  extent  based 
on  the  fact  that  the  strong  man  evokes  enthusiasm  and 
obedience. 

This  impulse  to  activity  is  an  unrest,  and  its  satis- 
faction lies  in  movement;  in  other  words  there  is  a 
pleasure  or  a  relief  in  mere  activity.  The  need  of  dis- 
charging energy,  the  desire  to  do  so,  the  pleasure  and 
satisfaction  in  so  doing  constitute  a  cornerstone  of  the 
foundation  of  life  and  character.  This  desire  for  ac- 
tivity, as  we  shall  call  it  henceforth,  is  behind  work  and 
play;  it  fluctuates  with  health  and  disease,  with  youth 
and  old  age ;  it  becomes  harnessed  to  purpose,  it  is  called 
into  being  by  motives  or  inhibited  by  conflict  and  inde- 
cision and  its  organization  is  the  task  of  society.  Men 
differ  in  regard  to  the  desire  for  activity,  with  a  range 


220  THE  FOUNDATIONS  OP  PERSONALITY 

from  the  inert  whose  energy  is  low  to  the  dynamic  types 
that  are  ever  busy  and  ever  seeking  more  to  do. 

The  child's  first  movements  are  aimless,  but  soon  the 
impressions  it  receives  by  striking  hands  and  feet 
against  soft  and  hard  things  bring  about  a  dim  knowl- 
edge of  the  boundaries  of  itself,  and  the  kinesthetic 
impulses  from  joints  and  muscles  help  this  knowledge. 
The  outside  world  commences  to  separate  itself  from 
the  "  me,"  though  both  are  vague  and  shadowy.  Soon 
it  learns  that  one  part  of  the  outside  world  is  able  to 
satisfy  its  hunger,  to  supply  a  need,  and  it  commences 
to  recognize  the  existence  of  benevolent  outside  agen- 
cies ;  and  it  also  learns  little  by  little  that  its  instinctive 
cries  bring  these  agencies  to  it.  I  do  not  mean  that 
the  baby  has  any  internal  language  corresponding  to  the 
idea  of  outside  agency,  benevolence,  etc.,  but  it  gets  to 
know  that  its  cries  are  potent,  that  a  breast  brings  re- 
lief and  satisfaction.  At  first  it  cries,  the  breast  comes, 
there  is  relief  and  satisfaction,  and  it  makes  no  connec- 
tion or  no  connection  is  made  between  these  events  of 
outer  and  inner  origin.  But  the  connection  is  finally 
made,  —  desire  becomes  definitely  articulate  in  the  cry 
of  the  baby,  which  thus  becomes  a  plea  and  a  summons. 
Anticipation  of  good  to  come  appears  and  with  it  the 
germ  of  hope  and  forward  looking,  and  there  is  realiza- 
tion or  disappointment,  joy  or  anger  or  sorrow.  Thus 
desire  is  linked  up  with  satisfaction  in  a  definite  way, 
ideas  and  feelings  of  demand  and  supply  begin  to  ap- 
pear and  perhaps  power  itself,  in  the  vague  notion,  "  I 
can  get  milk,"  commences  to  be  felt.  Social  life  starts 
when  the  child  associates  the  mother  with  the  milk, 
with  the  desire  and  the  satisfaction.  In  the  relation- 
ship established  between  mother  and  baby  is  the  first 
great  social  contact;  love,  friendship,  discipline,  teach- 


THE  EVOLUTION  OF  CHARACTER       221 

ing  and  belief  have  their  origin  when,  at  the  mother's 
breast,  the  child  separates  its  mother  from  the  rest  of 
the  things  of  the  world.  And  not  only  in  the  relief  of 
hunger  is  the  mother  active,  but  she  gets  to  be  asso- 
ciated with  the  relief  from  wet  and  irritating  clothes, 
the  pleasant  bath,  and  the  pleasure  of  the  change  of 
position  that  babies  cry  for.  Her  bosom  and  her  arms 
become  sources  of  pleasure,  and  the  race  has  immortal- 
ized them  as  symbolic  of  motherhood,  in  song,  in  story 
and  in  myth. 

Not  only  does  he  associate  the  mother  with  the  milk 
but  her  very  presence  brings  him  comfort,  even  when 
he  is  not  hungry.  It  is  within  the  first  few  months  of 
life  that  the  child  shows  that  he  is  a  gregarious  ^  animal, 
—  gregarious  in  the  sense  that  he  is  unhappy  away 
from  others.  To  be  alone  is  thus  felt  to  be  essentially  an 
evil,  to  be  with  others  is  in  itself  a  good.  This  gregarious 
feeling  is  the  sine  qua  non  of  social  life :  when  we  punish 
any  one  we  draw  away  from  him ;  when  we  reward  we 
get  closer  to  him.  All  his  life  the  child  is  to  find  pleas- 
ure in  being  with  people  and  unhappiness  when  away 
from  them,  unless  he  be  one  of  those  in  whom  the  gre- 
garious instinct  is  lacking.  For  instincts  may  be  ab- 
sent, just  as  eye  pigment  is;  there  are  mental  albinos 
lacking  the  color  of  ordinary  human  feeling.  Or  else 
some  experience  may  make  others  hateful  to  him,  or 
he  may  have  so  intellectualized  his  life  that  this  instinct 
has  atrophied.  This  gregarious  feeling  will  heighten 
his  emotions,  he  will  gather  strength  from  the  feeling 
that  "  others  are  with  him,"  he  will  join  societies,  clubs, 
organizations  in  response  to  the  same  feeling  that  makes 
sheep  graze  on  a  hillside  in  a  group,  that  makes  the 

*  One  of  my  children  would  stop  crying  if  some  one  merely  entered 
his  room  when  he  was  three  weeks  old.  He  was,  and  is,  an  intensely 
gregarious  boy. 


222  THE  FOUNDATIONS  OF  PERSONALITY 

monkeys  in  a  cage  squat  together,  rubbing  sides  and 
elbows.  The  home  in  which  our  child  finds  himself, 
though  a  social  institution,  is  not  gregarious;  it  gives 
him  only  a  limited  contact,  and  as  soon  as  he  is  able  and 
self-reliant  he  seeks  out  a  little  herd,  and  on  the  streets, 
in  the  schoolroom  and  playground,  he  really  becomes  a 
happy  little  herd  animal. 

Let  us  turn  back  to  the  desire  for  activity.  As  the 
power  to  direct  the  eyes  develops,  as  hands  become  a 
little  more  sure,  because  certain  pathways  in  brain  and 
cord  "  myelinize,"  ^  become  functional,  the  outside 
world  attracts  in  a  definite  manner  and  movements  be- 
come organized  by  desires,  by  purpose.  It's  a  red-letter 
day  in  the  calendar  of  a  human  being  when  he  first  suc- 
cessfully "  reaches  "  something ;  then  and  there  is  the 
birth  of  power  and  of  successful  effort.  All  our  ideas 
of  cause  and  effect  originate  when  we  cause  changes 
in  the  world,  when  we  move  a  thing  from  thither  to 
yon.  No  philosopher,  though  he  becomes  so  intellect- 
ualized  that  he  cannot  understand  how  one  thing  or 
event  causes  another,  ever  escapes  from  the  feeling  that 
he  causes  effects.  Purpose,  resistance,  success,  failure, 
cause,  effect,  these  become  inextricably  wound  up  with 
our  thoughts  and  beliefs  from  the  early  days  when, 
looking  at  a  dangling  string,  we  reached  for  it  once, 
twice,  a  dozen  times  and  brought  it  in  triumph  to  our 
mouth.  And  our  idea  that  there  were  forbidden  things 
came  when  the  watchful  mother  took  it  out  of  our 
mouth,  saying,  "  No,  no,  baby  mustn't !  " 

At  any  rate,  the  organization  of  activity  for  definite 

*  At  birth,  though  most  of  the  great  nervous  pathways  are  laid  down, 
they  are  non-functional  largely  because  the  fiuers  that  compose  them 
are  unclothed,  non-myelinated.  The  various  kinds  of  tracts  have  dif- 
ferent times  for  becoming  "  myelinated "  as  was  the  discovery  of  the 
great  analogist,  Flechsig. 


THE  EVOLUTION  OF  CHARACTER       223 

purposes  starts.  The  little  investigator  is  apparently 
obsessed  with  the  idea  that  everything  it  can  reach, 
including  its  fingers  and  toes,  are  good  to  eat,  for  every- 
thing reached  is  at  once  brought  to  the  mouth,  the 
primitive  curiosity  thus  being  gustatory.  In  this  re- 
search the  baby  finds  that  some  few  things  are  pleasant, 
many  indifferent  and  quite  a  few  disgusting  and  even 
painful,  which  may  remain  as  a  result  not  far  different 
from  that  obtained  by  investigation  in  later  years.  The 
desire  for  pleasant  things  commences  to  guide  its  activ- 
ities. Every  new  thing  is  at  once  an  object  for  inves- 
tigation, perhaps  because  its  possibilities  for  pleasure 
are  unknown.  That  curiosity  may  have  some  such 
origin  is  at  least  a  plausible  statement.  At  any  rate, 
desire  of  a  definite  type  steps  in  to  organize  the  mere 
desire  for  activity ;  and  impulse  is  controlled  by  purpose. 
The  child  learns  to  creep,  and  the  delight  in  progres- 
sion lies  in  the  fact  that  far  more  things  are  accessible 
for  investigation,  for  rearrangement,  for  tasting.  It  is 
no  accident  that  we  speak  of  our  "  tastes  "  that  we  say, 
"  I  want  to  taste  of  experience."  That  is  exactly  what 
the  child  creeping  on  the  floor  seeks,  —  to  taste  of  ex- 
perience and  to  anticipate,  to  realize,  to  learn.  Out 
of  the  desire  for  activity  grows  a  desire  for  experience 
born  of  the  pleasure  of  excitement  that  we  spoke  of  pre- 
viously. This  desire  for  experience  becomes  built  up 
into  strange  forms  under  teaching  and  through  the  re- 
sults of  experience.  It  is  very  strong  in  some  who  be- 
come explorers,  rou6s,  vagabonds,  scientists  as  a  result, 
and  it  is  very  weak  in  others  who  stay  at  home  and  seek 
only  the  safe  and  limited  experience.  You  see  two  chil- 
dren in  one  room,  —  and  one  sits  in  the  middle  of  the 
floor,  perhaps  playing  with  a  toy  or  looking  around, 
and  the  other  has  investigated  the  stove  and  found  it 


224  THE  FOUNDATIONS  OF  PERSONALITY 

hotter  than  he  supposed,  has  been  under  the  table  and 
bumped  his  head,  has  found  an  unusually  sweet  white 
lump  which  in  later  life  he  will  call  sugar.  The  good 
child  is  often  without  sufficient  curiosity  to  be  bad, 
whereas  the  bad  child  may  be  an  overzealous  seeker  of 
experience. 

So  our  child  reaching  out  for  things  develops  ideas  of 
cause,  effect  and  power,  commences  to  have  an  idea  of 
himself  as  a  cause  and  likes  the  feeling  of  power.  As 
he  learns  to  walk,  the  world  widens,  his  sense  of  power 
grows,  and  his  feeling  of  personality  increases.  Mean- 
while another  side  of  his  nature  has  been  developing 
and  one  fully  as  important. 

The  persons  in  his  world  have  become  quite  individ- 
ual; mother  is  now  not  alone,  for  father  is  recognized 
with  pleasure  as  one  who  likewise  is  desirable.  He 
carries  one  on  his  shoulder  so  that  a  pleasurable  excite- 
ment results;  he  plays  with  one,  holds  out  strings  and 
toys  and  other  instruments  for  the  obtaining  of  exper- 
ience. Usually  both  of  these  great  personages  are 
friendly,  their  faces  wear  a  smile  or  a  tender  look,  and 
our  little  one  is  so  organized  that  smiles  and  tender 
looks  awaken  comfortable  feelings  and  he  smiles  in  re- 
turn. The  smile  is  perhaps  the  first  great  message  one 
human  being  sends  to  another ;  it  says,  "  See,  I  am 
friendly,  I  wish  you  well."  Later  on  in  the  history  of 
the  child,  he  will  learn  much  about  smiles  of  other 
kinds,  but  at  this  stage  they  are  all  pleasant.  Though 
his  parents  are  usually  friendly  and  give,  now  and  then 
they  deprive,  and  they  look  different ;  they  say,  "  No, 
no ! "  This  "  no,  no  "  is  social  inhibition,  it  is  backed 
up  by  the  power  of  deprivation,  punishment,  disapprov- 
al; it  has  its  power  in  a  something  in  our  nature  that 
gives  society  its  power  over  us.    From  now  there  steps  in 


THE  EVOLUTION  OF  CHARACTER       225 

a  factor  in  the  development  of  character  of  which  we 
have  already  spoken,  a  group  of  desires  that  have  their 
source  in  the  emotional  response  of  the  child  to  the  par- 
ent, in  the  emotional  response  of  an  individual  to  his 
group.  Out  of  the  social  pressure  arises  the  desire  to 
please,  to  win  approval,  to  get  justification,  and  these 
struggle  in  the  mind  of  the  child  with  other  desires. 

We  said  the  child  seeks  experience,  —  but  not  only 
on  his  own  initiative.  The  father  stands  against  the 
wall,  perhaps  with  one  foot  crossing  the  other.  Soon 
he  feels  a  pressure  and  looks  down;  there  is  the  little 
one  standing  in  his  imitation  of  the  same  position. 
Imitation,  in  my  belief,  is  secondary  to  a  desire  for  ex- 
perience. The  child  does  not  imitate  everything;  he  is 
equipped  to  notice  only  simple  things,  and  these  he 
imitates.  Why?  The  desire  to  experience  what  others 
are  experiencing  is  a  basic  desire;  it  expresses  both  a 
feeling  of  fellowship  and  a  competitive  feeling.  We 
do  not  feel  a  strong  tendency  to  imitate  those  we  dis- 
like or  despise,  or  do  not  respect,  we  tend  to  imitate  those 
we  love  and  respect,  those  for  whom  we  have  a  fellow 
feeling.  Part  of  the  fellow  feeling  is  an  impulse  to  imi- 
tate and  to  receive  in  a  positive  way  the  suggestion  of- 
fered by  their  conduct  and  manners. 

Analogous  to  imitation,  and  part  of  the  social  instinct, 
is  a  credulity,  a  willingness  to  accept  as  if  personally 
experienced  things  stated.  Part  of  the  seeking  of  ex- 
perience is  the  asking  of  questions,  because  the  mind 
seeks  a  cause  for  every  effect,  a  something  to  work  from. 
Indeed,  one  of  the  main  mental  activities  lies  in  the  ex- 
plaining of  things;  an  unrest  is  felt  in  the  presence 
of  the  "  not  understood  "  which  is  not  stilled  until  the 
unknown  is  referred  back  to  a  thing  understood  or  ac- 
cepted without  question.     The  child  finds  himself  in  a 


226  THE  FOUNDATIONS  OF  PERSONALITY 

world  with  laid -down  beliefs  and  with  explanations  of 
one  kind  or  another  for  everything.  His  group  differs 
from  other  groups  in  its  explanations  and  beliefs;  his 
family  even  may  be  peculiar  in  these  matters.  He  asks, 
he  is  answered  and  enjoined  to  believe.  Without  cred- 
ulity there  could  be  no  organization  of  society,  no  rituals, 
no  ceremonials,  no  religions  and  customs,  —  but  with- 
out the  questioning  spirit  there  could  be  no  progress. 
Most  of  the  men  and  women  of  this  world  have  much 
credulity  and  only  a  feeble  questioning  tendency,  but 
there  are  a  few  who  from  the  start  subject  the  answers 
given  them  to  a  rigid  scrutiny  and  who  test  belief  by 
results.  Let  any  one  read  the  beliefs  of  savages,  let 
him  study  the  beliefs  of  the  civilized  in  the  spirit  in 
which  he  would  test  the  statement  of  the  performance 
of  an  automobile,  and  he  can  but  marvel  at  man's  cred- 
ulity. Belief  and  the  acceptance  of  authority  are  the 
conservative  forces  of  society,  and  they  have  their  origin 
in  the  nursery  when  the  child  asks,  "  Why  does  the 
moon  get  smaller?  "  and  the  mother  answers,  "  Because, 
dear,  God  cuts  a  piece  off  every  day  to  make  the  stars 
with."  The  authorities,  recognizing  that  their  power 
lay  in  unquestioning  belief,  have  always  sanctified 
it  and  made  the  pious,  non-skeptical  type  the  ideal  and 
punished  the  non-believer  with  death  or  ostracism. 
Fortunately  for  the  race,  the  skeptic,  if  silenced,  modi- 
fies the  strength  of  the  belief  he  attacks  and  in  the 
course  of  time  even  they  who  have  defended  begin  to 
shift  from  it  and  it  becomes  refuted.  Beliefs,  as  Lecky  * 
so  well  pointed  out,  are  not  so  often  destroyed  as  become 
obsolete. 

*  Lecky:  "History  of  European  Morals."  As  he  points  out,  the 
belief  in  witchcraft  never  was  disproved,  it  simply  died  because  science 
made  it  impossible  to  believe  that  witches  could  disorganize  natural 
laws. 


THE  EVOLUTION  OF  CHARACTER       227 

It  may  seem  as  if  imitation  were  a  separate  prin- 
ciple in  mental  growth,  and  there  have  been  many  to 
state  this.  As  is  well  known  Tarde  made  it  a  leading 
factor  in  human  development.  It  seems  to  me  that  it  is 
linked  up  with  desire  for  experience,  desire  for  fellow- 
ship, and  also  with  a  strongly  competitive  feeling,  which 
is  early  manifest  in  children  and  which  may  be  called 
"  a  want  of  what  the  other  fellow  has."  Children  at  the 
age  of  a  year  and  up  may  be  perfectly  pleased  with 
what  they  have  until  they  see  another  child  playing  with 
something,  —  something  perhaps  identical  with  their 
own.  They  then  betray  a  decided,  uncontrollable  desire 
for  the  other  child's  toy;  they  are  no  longer  content 
with  their  own,  and  by  one  means  or  another  they  seek 
to  get  it,  —  by  forcible  means,  by  wheedling  or  coaxing, 
or  by  tormenting  their  parents.  The  disappearance  of 
contentment  through  the  competitive  feeling,  the  com- 
petitive nature  of  desire,  the  role  that  envy  plays  in  the 
happiness  and  effort  of  man,  is  a  thesis  emphasized  by 
every  moralist  and  philosopher  since  the  beginning  of 
things.  In  the  strivings  of  every  man,  though  he  admit 
it  or  not,  one  of  the  secret  springs  of  his  energy  is  this 
law  of  desire,  that  a  large  part  of  its  power  and  per- 
sistence is  in  the  competitive  feeling,  is  in  envy  and  the 
wish  to  taste  what  others  are  experiencing. 

A  basic  law  of  desire  lies  in  an  observation  of  Lotze, 
elaborated  by  William  James.  We  may  talk  of  selfish- 
ness and  altruism  as  if  they  were  entirely  separate 
qualities  of  human  nature.  But  what  seems  to  be  true 
is  that  one  is  an  extension  of  the  other,  that  is,  we  are 
always  concerned  with  the  ego  feeling,  but  in  the  one 
case  the  ego  feeling  is  narrow  and  in  the  other  case  it 
includes  others  as  part  of  the  ego.  Lotze's  observations 
on  clothes  shows  that  we  expend  ego  feeling  in  all 


228  THE  FOUNDATIONS  OF  PERSONALITY 

directions,  that  we  tend  to  be  as  tall  as  our  top  hats 
and  as  penetrating  as  our  walking  sticks,  that  the  man 
who  has  a  club  in  his  hand  has  a  tactile  sense  to  the  very 
end  of  the  club.  James  in  his  marvelous  chapter  on 
the  various  selves  points  out  that  a  man's  interests  and 
affections  are  his  selves,  and  that  they  enclose  one  an- 
other like  the  petals  of  a  rose.  We  may  speak  of  uni- 
petalar  selves,  who  include  only  their  own  bodies  in 
self -feeling;  of  bipetalar  selves  who  include  in  it  their 
families,  and  from  there  on  we  go  to  selves  who  include 
their  work,  their  community,  their  nation,  until  we 
reach  those  very  rare  souls  whose  petals  cover  all  living 
things.  So  men  extend  their  self-feeling,  if  ambitious, 
to  their  work,  to  their  achievements,  —  if  paternal  to 
their  children ;  if  domestic,  to  wife  and  home ;  if  patri- 
otic to  the  nation,  etc.  Development  lies  in  the  exten- 
sion of  the  self-feeling  and  in  the  increase  of  its 
intensity.  But  the  obstacle  lies  in  the  competitive  feel- 
ings, in  that  dualism  of  man's  nature  that  makes  him 
yearn  not  only  for  fellowship,  but  also  for  superiority. 
These  desires  are  in  eternal  opposition,  but  are  not  nec- 
essarily antagonistic,  any  more  than  are  the  thumb  and 
the  little  finger  as  they  meet  in  some  task,  any  more 
than  are  excitation  and  inhibition.  Every  function  in 
our  lives  has  its  check  and  balance,  and  fellowship, 
yearning  and  superiority  urge  one  another. 

From  the  cradle  to  the  grave,  we  desire  fellowship  as 
an  addition  to  our  gregarious  feeling.  We  ask  for  ap- 
proval, for  we  expand  under  sympathy  and  contract 
under  cold  criticism.  Nothing  is  so  pleasant  as  "  ap- 
preciation," which  means  taking  us  at  our  own  valua- 
tion or  adding  to  it,  and  there  is  no  complaint  so  com- 
mon as,  "  They  don't  understand  me,"  wliich  merely 
means,  "  They  blame  me  without  understanding  that  I 


THE  EVOLUTION  OF  CHARACTER       229 

really  seek  the  good,  that  I  am  really  good,  though  per- 
haps I  seem  not  to  be."  The  child  who  hurts  its  thumb 
runs  to  its  mother  for  sympathy,  and  the  pain  is  com- 
pensated for,  at  least  in  part,  by  that  sympathy. 
Throughout  life  we  desire  sympathy  for  our  hurts,  ex- 
cept where  that  sympathy  brings  with  it  a  feeling  of 
inferiority.  To  be  helped  by  others  in  one  way  or 
another  is  the  practical  result  of  this  aspect  of  fellow- 
ship. 

(There  is  a  convincing  physical  element  in  the  feel- 
ings and  desires  of  man,  evidenced  in  language  and 
phrase.  Superiority  equals  aboveness,  inferiority 
equals  beneathness;  sympathy  equals  the  same  feeling. 
To  criticize  is  to  "  belittle  "  and  to  cause  the  feeling  of 
littleness ;  to  praise  is  "  to  make  a  man  expand,"  to  en- 
large him.  Blame  hurts  one's  feelings,  —  "  He  wounded 
me,''  etc.) 

At  the  same  time  we  are  strangely  affected  by  the 
condition  of  others.  Where  no  competitive-jealousy 
complex  is  at  work,  we  laugh  with  other  people  in  their 
happiness,  we  are  moved  to  tears  by  suffering;  we  ad- 
mire vigor,  beauty  and  the  fine  qualities  of  others;  we 
accept  their  purposes  and  beliefs ;  we  are  glad  to  agree 
with  the  stranger  or  the  friend  and  hate  to  disagree. 
We  establish  within  ourselves  codes  and  standards 
largely  because  we  wish  to  accept  and  believe  and  act 
in  the  same  way  as  do  those  we  want  as  fellows.  Hav- 
ing set  up  that  code  as  conscience  or  ideals,  it  helps  us 
to  govern  our  lives,  it  gives  a  stability  in  that  we  tend 
at  once  to  resist  jealousy,  envy,  the  "  wrong  "  emotions 
and  actions.  "Helping  others"  becomes  a  great  mo- 
tive in  life,  responding  to  misery  with  tears,  consolation 
and  kindness,  reacting  to  the  good  deeds  of  others  with 


230  THE  FOUNDATIONS  OF  PERSONALITY 

praise.  To  be  generous  and  charitable  becomes  method 
for  the  extension  of  fellowship. 

Asking  for  help  in  its  varied  form  of  praise,  apprecia- 
tion and  kindness,  giving  help  as  appreciation  and  kind- 
ness, are  the  weak  and  strong  aspects  of  the  fellowship 
feelings.  It  is  a  cynical  view  of  life,  perhaps,  but  it  is 
probably  true  that  the  weak  phase  is  more  common  and 
more  constant  than  the  second.  Almost  everybody  loves 
praise  and  appreciation,  for  these  enlarge  the  ego  feel- 
ing, and  some,  perhaps  most,  like  to  be  helped,  though 
here,  as  was  above  stated,  there  is  a  feeling  of  inferiority 
aroused  which  may  be  painful.  Relatively  there  are 
few  who  are  ready  to  praise,  especially  those  with  whom 
they  are  in  close  contact  and  with  whom  they  are  in  a 
sort  of  rivalry.  The  same  is  true  of  genuine  appre- 
ciation, of  real  warm  fellow  feeling ;  the  leader,  the  hero, 
the  great  man  receives  that  but  not  the  fellow  next  door. 
As  for  giving,  charity,  kindness,  these  are  common 
enough  in  a  sporadic  fashion,  but  rarely  are  they  sus- 
tained and  constant,  and  often  they  have  to  depend  on 
the  desire  "  not  to  be  outdone,"  not  to  seem  inferior,  — 
have,  as  it  were,  to  be  shamed  into  activity.  For  there 
is  competition  even  in  fellowship. 

There  are  people,  especially  among  the  hysterics,  who 
are  deeply  wounded  when  sympathy  is  not  given,  when 
appreciation  and  praise  is  withheld  or  if  there  is  the 
suggestion  of  criticism.  They  are  people  of  a  "  tender 
ego,"  not  self-sustaining,  demanding  the  help  of  others 
and  reacting  to  the  injury  sustained,  when  it  is  not 
given,  by  prolonged  emotion.  These  sensitive  folk,  who 
form  a  most  difflcult  group,  do  not  all  react  alike,  of 
course.  Some  respond  with  anger  and  ideas  of  persecu- 
tion, some  with  a  prolonged  humiliation  and  feeling  of 
inferiority;   still   others   develop    symptoms   that  are 


THE  EVOLUTION  OF  CHARACTER        231 

meant  to  appeal  to  the  conscience  of  the  one  who  has 
wounded  them.  On  the  other  hand,  there  are  those 
whose  feeling  of  self  sustains  them  in  the  face  of  most 
criticism,  who  depend  largely  upon  the  established  men- 
tor within  themselves  and  who  seek  to  conform  to  the 
rulings  of  that  inward  mentor.  Such  people,  if  not 
martyred  too  soon,  and  if  possessed  of  a  fruitful  ideal, 
lay  new  criteria  for  praise  and  blame. 

Contrasting  with  the  desires  and  purposes  of  fellow- 
ship we  find  the  desires  and  purposes  of  superiority  and 
power.  Primarily  these  are  based  on  what  McDougall 
calls  the  instinct  of  self-display,  which  becomes  intel- 
lectualized  and  socialized  very  early  in  the  career  of 
the  child.  In  fact,  we  might  judge  a  man  largely  by 
the  way  he  displays  himself,  whether  by  some  essentially 
personal  bodily  character,  some  essentially  mental  at- 
tribute or  some  essentially  moral  quality;  whether  he 
seeks  superiority  as  a  means  of  getting  power  or  as  a 
means  of  doing  good;  whether  he  seeks  it  within  or 
without  the  code.  One  might  go  on  indefinitely,  in- 
cluding such  matters  as  whether  he  seeks  superiority 
with  tact  or  the  reverse  and  whether  he  understands  the 
essential  shallowness  and  futility  of  his  pursuit  or  not. 
To  he  superior  is  hack  of  most  of  striving,  and  it 
is  the  most  camouflaged  of  all  human  motives  and  pleas- 
ures. For  this  is  true:  that  the  preaching  of  humility, 
of  righteous  conduct,  of  service,  of  self-sacrifice,  hy  re- 
ligion and  ethics  have  convinced  man  that  these  are  the 
qualities  one  ought  to  have.  So  men  seek,  whenever 
they  can,  to  dress  their  other  motives  and  feelings  in 
the  garh  of  altruism. 

Camouflage  of  motive  as  a  means  of  social  approval 
has  thus  become  a  very  important  part  of  character; 
we  seek  constantly  to  penetrate  the  camouflage  of  our 


232  THE  FOUNDATIONS  OF  PERSONALITY 

rivals  and  enemies  and  bitterly  resist  any  effort  to  strip 
away  our  own,  often  enough  hiding  it  successfully  from 
ourselves.  There  are  few  who  face  boldly  their  own 
egoism,  and  their  sincerity  is  often  admired.  Indeed, 
the  frank  child  is  admired  because  his  egoism  is  refresh- 
ing, i.  e.,  he  offers  no  problem  to  the  observer.  Out  of 
the  uneasiness  that  we  feel  in  the  presence  of  dissimula- 
tion and  insincerity  has  arisen  the  value  we  place  on 
sincerity,  frankness  and  honesty.  To  be  accused  of  in- 
sincerity or  dishonesty  of  motive  and  act  is  fiercely  re- 
sented. 

The  desire  for  power  and  superiority  will  of  course 
take  different  directions  in  each  person,  according  to 
his  make-up,  teaching  and  the  other  circumstances  of 
his  life.  Property  as  a  means  of  pleasure,  and  as  a  sym- 
bol of  achievement  and  of  personal  worth,  is  valued 
highly  from  the  earliest  days  of  the  child's  life.  Very 
early  does  the  child  show  that  it  prizes  goods,  shows 
an  acquisitive  trend  that  becomes  finally  glorified  into 
a  goal,  an  ambition.  Money  and  goods  become  the  sym- 
bol and  actuality  of  power,  triumph,  superiority,  pleas- 
ure, safety,  benevolence  and  a  dozen  and  one  other 
things.  Men  who  seek  money  and  goods  may  there- 
fore be  seeking  very  different  things;  one  is  merely 
acquisitive,  has  the  miser  trend;  another  loves  the  game 
for  the  game's  sake,  picks  up  houses,  bonds,  money, 
ships,  as  a  fighter  picks  up  trophies,  and  they  stand  to 
him  as  symbols  of  his  superiority.  Some  see  in  prop- 
erty the  fulcrum  by  which  they  can  apply  the  power 
that  will  shift  the  lives  of  other  men  and  make  of  them- 
selves a  sort  of  God  or  Fate  in  the  destinies  of  others. 
For  others,  and  for  all  in  part,  there  is  in  money  the 
safety  against  emergencies  and  further  a  something  that 
purchases  pleasure,  whether  that  pleasure  be  of  body, 


THE  EVOLUTION  OF  CHARACTER        233 

or  taste  or  spirit.  Wine  and  women,  pictures  and  beau- 
tiful things,  leisure  for  research  and  contemplation,  — 
money  buys  any  and  all  of  these,  and  as  the  symbol  of 
all  kinds  of  value,  as  the  symbol  of  all  kinds  of  power, 
it  is  sought  assiduously  by  all  kinds  of  men. 

There  are  many  who  start  on  their  careers  with  the 
feeling  and  belief  that  money  is  a  minor  value,  that 
to  be  useful  and  of  service  is  greater  than  to  be  rich. 
But  this  idealistic  ambition  in  only  a  few  cases  stands 
up  against  the  strain  of  life.  Unless  money  comes,  a 
man  cannot  marry,  or  if  he  marries,  then  his  wife  must 
do  without  ease  and  leisure  and  pretty  things,  and  he 
must  live  in  a  second-rate  way.  Sooner  or  later  the 
idealist  feels  himself  uneasily  inferior,  and  though  he 
may  compensate  by  achievement  or  by  developing  a 
strong  trend  towards  seclusiveness,  more  often  he  re- 
grets bitterly  his  idealism  and  in  his  heart  envies  the 
rich.  For  they,  ignorant  and  arrogant,  may  purchase 
his  services,  his  brains  and  self-sacrifice  and  buy  these 
ingredients  of  himself  with  the  air  of  one  purchasing  a 
machine.  So  the  idealist  finds  himself  condemned  to 
a  meager  life,  unless  his  idealism  brings  him  wealth, 
and  he  drifts  in  spirit  away  from  the  character  of  his 
youth.  It  is  the  strain  of  life,  the  fear  of  old  age  and 
sickness,  the  silent  pressure  of  the  deprivations  of  a 
man's  beloved  ones,  the  feeling  of  helplessness  in  dis- 
aster and  the  silent  envious  feeling  of  inferiority  that 
makes  inroads  in  the  ranks  of  the  idealists  so  that  at 
twenty  there  are  ten  idealists  to  the  one  found  at  forty. 

I  remember  well  one  of  my  colleagues,  working  pa- 
tiently in  a  laboratory,  out  of  sight  of  the  world  and 
out  of  the  stream  of  financial  reward,  enthused  by 
science  and  service,  who  threw  up  his  work  and  went 
into  the  practice  of  medicine.     "Why?"  I  asked  him. 


234  THE  FOUNDATIONS  OF  PERSONALITY 

"  Because  when  one  of  my  brothers  took  sick  and  was 
in  dire  need,  I  who  loved  him  could  not  help.  I  had 
no  money,  and  all  my  monographs  put  together  could 
not  help  him  buy  a  meal.  There  is  a  cousin  of  ours, 
who  has  grown  rich  running  a  cheap  moving-picture 
house,  where  the  taste  of  the  community  is  debauched 
every  day.  He  lent  my  brother  two  thousand  dollars 
out  of  his  superfluities ;  it  involved  no  sacrifice  to  him, 
for  he  purchased  a  third  car  at  the  same  time  —  and 
yet  he  is  our  savior.  Love  alone  is  a  torture.  I  am 
going  to  get  money." 

The  world  is  built  up  on  the  sacrifices  of  the  ideal- 
ists, and  eternally  it  crucifies  them.  Wealth  and  power 
are  to  him  who  has  a  marketable  commodity,  and  one 
cannot  complain  when  true  genius  becomes  rich.  But 
the  genius  to  make  money  may  be  and  often  is  —  an 
exploiting  type  of  ability,  a  selfishly  practical  industry, 
which  neither  invents  nor  is  of  great  service.  The  men 
who  now  do  the  basic  work  in  invention  and  scientific 
work  in  laboratories  are  poorly  paid  and  only  now  and 
then  honored.  Every  year  in  the  United  States  hun- 
dreds of  them  leave  their  work  in  research  and  seek 
"  paying  jobs,"  to  the  impoverishment  of  the  world,  but 
to  their  own  financial  benefit.  Countries  where  the 
scramble  for  wealth  is  not  so  keen,  where  the  best  brains 
do  not  find  themselves  pressed  into  business,  produce 
far  more  science,  art  and  literature  than  we  do,  with 
all  our  wealth.  We  will  continue  to  be  a  second-rate 
nation  in  these  regards,  still  looking  for  our  great 
American  novel  and  play,  still  seeking  real  singers  and 
artists,  until  our  idealism  can  withstand  the  pressure 
of  our  practical  civilization. 

For  here  is  a  great  division  in  people.  There  are 
those  who  become  enthused  by  the  noble  aims  of  life, 


THE  EVOLUTION  OF  CHARACTER       235 

by  the  superiority  and  service  that  come  in  the  work 
of  teacher,  priest,  physician,  scientist,  philosopher  and 
philanthropist,  and  those  that  seek  superiority  and 
power  in  wealth,  station  and  influence.  Those  who  will 
fellowship  and  those  who  will  power  is  a  short  way  of 
putting  it,  the  idealists  and  the  practical  is  another. 
Fellowship  is  built  up  on  sympathy,  pity,  friendliness 
and  the  desire  to  help  others;  it  is  essentially  demo- 
cratic, and  in  it  runs  the  cooperative  activities  of  man. 
For  it  is  not  true  that  "  competition  is  the  life  of 
trade  " ;  cooperation  is  its  life.  Men  dig  ore  in  mines, 
others  transport  their  produce,  others  smelt  it  and  work 
it  into  shape,  according  to  the  designs  and  plans  of  still 
other  men;  then  it  is  transported  by  new  groups  and 
marketed  by  an  endless  chain  of  men  whose  labors 
dovetail  to  the  end  that  mankind  has  a  tool,  a  habita- 
tion or  an  ornament.  The  past  and  present  cooperate 
in  this  labor,  as  do  the  remote  ends  of  the  earth.  Com- 
petition is  the  spur  of  trade;  its  mighty  sinews,  its 
strong  heart  and  stout  lungs  are  cooperative. 

Power  is  aristocratic,  and  elaborates  and  calls  into 
play  the  competitive  spirit.  In  all  men  the  desire  for 
power  and  the  desire  for  fellowship  blend  and  interplay 
in  their  ambitions  and  activities ;  in  some  fellowship  pre- 
dominates, in  others  power.  If  a  man  specializes  in 
fellowship  aims,  without  learning  the  secret  of  power, 
he  is  usually  futile  and  sterile  of  results ;  if  a  man  seeks 
power  only  and  disregards  fellowship,  he  is  hated  and 
is  a  tyrant,  cruel  and  without  pity.  To  be  an  idealist 
and  practical  is  of  course  diflflcult  and  usually  involves 
a  compromise  of  the  ideal.  Some  degree  of  compro- 
mise is  necessary,  and  the  rigid  idealist  would  have  a 
better  sanction  for  his  refusal  to  compromise  if  he  or 
any  one  could  be  sure  of  the  perfection  of  his  ideal. 


236  THE  FOUNDATIONS  OF  PERSONALITY 

The  practical  seek  their  own  welfare  or  the  welfare 
of  others  through  direct  means,  through  exerting  the 
power  and  the  influence  that  is  money  and  station. 
Rarely  do  they  build  for  a  distant  future,  and  their 
goal  is  in  some  easily  and  popularly  understood  good. 
What  they  say  and  what  they  do  applies  to  getting 
rich  or  healthy,  to  being  good  in  a  conventional  way; 
success  is  their  goal  and  that  success  lies  in  the  tan- 
gibles of  life.  They  easily  become  sordid  and  mean, 
since  it  is  not  possible  always  to  separate  good  and 
evil  when  one  is  governed  by  expediency  and  limited 
idea  of  welfare.  This  is  also  true,  —  that  while  the 
practical  usually  tend  to  lose  idealism  entirely,  and 
find  themselves  the  tools  of  habits  and  customs  they 
cannot  break  from,  now  and  then  a  practical  man  reaches 
a  high  place  of  power  and  becomes  the  idealist. 

Though  all  men  seek  power  and  fellowship,  we  have 
a  right  to  ask  what  are  a  man's  leading  pursuits.  And 
we  must  be  prepared  to  tear  off  a  mask  before  we  un- 
derstand the  most  of  our  fellows,  for  society  and  all 
of  life  is  permeated  with  disguise.  Now  and  then  one 
seeks  to  appear  worse  than  he  is,  hates  fuss  and  praise, 
but  this  rare  bird  (to  use  slang  and  Latin  in  one  phrase) 
is  the  exception  that  proves  the  rule  that  men  on  the 
whole  try  to  appear  better  than  they  are.  Rarely  does 
a  man  say,  "  I  am  after  profit  and  nothing  else,"  al- 
though occasionally  he  does;  rarely  does  the  scientist 
say,  "  I  seek  fame  and  reward,"  even  though  his  main 
stimulus  may  be  this  desire  and  not  the  ideal  of  adding 
to  the  knowledge  of  the  world.  Behind  the  philanthro- 
pist may  lurk  the  pleasure  in  changing  the  lives  of 
others,  behind  the  reformer  the  picture  of  himself  in 
history.  The  best  of  men  may  and  do  cherish  power 
motives,  and  we  must  say  that  to  seek  power  is  ethi- 


THE  EVOLUTION  OF  CHARACTER        237 

cally  good,  provided  it  does  not  injure  fellowship.  One 
must  not,  however,  be  misled  by  words;  duty,  service, 
fellowship  come  as  often  to  the  lips  of  the  selfish  as  the 
unselfish. 

We  spoke  of  power  as  a  form  of  superiority.  Since 
all  superiority  is  comparative,  there  are  various  indirect 
ways  of  seeking  superiority  and  avoiding  inferiority. 
One  of  these  is  by  adverse  criticism  of  our  fellows.  The 
widespread  love  of  gossip,  the  quick  and  ever-present 
tendency  to  disparage  others,  especially  the  fortunate 
and  the  successful,  are  manifestations  of  this  type  of 
superiority  seeking.  Half  the  humor  of  the  world  is 
the  pleasure,  produced  by  a  technique,  of  feeling  su- 
perior to  the  boor,  the  pedant,  the  fool,  the  new  rich, 
the  pompous,  the  over-dignified,  etc.  Half,  more  than 
half,  of  the  conversation  that  goes  on  in  boudoir,  din- 
ing room,  over  the  drinks  and  in  the  smoking  room,  is 
criticism,  playful  and  otherwise,  of  others.  There  are 
people  in  whom  the  adversely  critical  spirit  is  so  highly 
developed  that  they  find  it  hard  to  praise  any  one  or 
to  hear  any  one  praised  —  their  criticism  leaps  to  the 
surface  in  one  way  or  another,  in  the  sneer,  in  the 
"  butt,"  in  the  joke,  in  the  gibe,  in  the  openly  expressed 
attack.  This  way  of  being  superior  may  be  direct  and 
open,  more  often  it  is  disguised.  Many  a  woman  (and 
man)  who  denounces  the  sinner  receives  from  her  con- 
templation of  that  sinner  the  most  of  her  feeling  of 
virtue  and  goodness.  The  more  bitterly  the  self- 
acknowledged  "  saint "  denounces  the  sinner,  the  more, 
by  implication,  he  praises  himself. 

People  seek  the  strangest  roads  to  the  feeling  of  su- 
periority. From  that  classical  imbecile  who  burnt  down 
the  Temple  of  Diana  to  the  crop  of  young  girls  who  in- 
vent tales  of  white  slavery  in  order  to  stand  in  the 


238  THE  FOUNDATIONS  OF  PERSONALITY 

public  eye  as  conspicuous  victims,  notoriety  has  been 
mistaken  for  fame  by  those  desperate  for  public  atten- 
tion. To  be  superior  some  way,  even  if  only  in  crime 
and  foolishness,  brings  about  an  immense  amount  of 
laughable  and  deplorable  conduct  to  which  only  a  Juve- 
nal could  do  justice.  The  world  yields  to  superiority 
such  immense  tribute  that  to  obtain  recognition  as 
superior  becomes  a  dominant  motive.  How  that 
superiority  is  to  be  reached  presents  great  diflflculties, 
and  the  problem  is  solved  according  to  the  character  of 
the  individual. 

At  the  same  time  that  we  seek  superiority  we  seek  to 
be  liked,  to  be  esteemed,  to  be  respected.  These  are  not 
the  same  things,  but  are  suflflciently  alike  in  principle 
to  be  classed  together.  With  some  the  desire  to  be  liked 
becomes  a  motive  that  ruins  firmness  of  purpose  and  suc- 
cess, as  in  the  well-known  "  good  fellow,"  —  accommo- 
dating, obliging  and  friendly,  who  sacrifices  achievement 
to  this  minor  form  of  fellowship.  On  a  larger  plane 
there  is  the  writer  or  artist  who  sacrifices  his  best  capaci- 
ties in  order  to  please  the  popular  fancy,  seeks  popular- 
ity rather  than  greatness,  for  it  is  seldom  that  the  two 
coincide.  Back  of  many  a  man's  "  respectability  "  is  the 
fear  of  being  disliked  or  discredited  by  his  group.  To 
he  respectable,  to  live  so  that  neither  the  neighbors  nor 
one's  own  rather  uncritical  conscience  can  criticize,  is 
perhaps  the  most  common  aim  in  life.  There  are  some 
who  are  all  things  to  all  men,  merely  out  of  the  desire 
to  be  agreeable,  who  find  it  easy  to  agree  with  any 
opinion,  because  they  have  not  the  courage  to  be  dis- 
liked. Even  the  greatest  men  yield  to  the  desire  to  be 
admired  and  liked,  though  the  test  of  greatness  is  un- 
popularity. 

For  there  never  can  be  a  real  and  lasting  democ- 


THE  EVOLUTION  OF  CHARACTER        239 

racy  in  belief,  opinion  and  ideal.  The  mass  must  always 
lag  behind  the  leaders,  since  it  takes  a  generation  or 
two  for  the  ideas  of  the  old  leaders  to  permeate  any 
society.  Now  and  then  a  great  leader  finds  a  great  fol- 
lowing in  his  own  lifetime,  but  his  leadership  rarely 
involves  a  new  principle.  There  will  always  be  a  few 
ground  breakers,  behind  them  a  few  straggling  follow- 
ers, and  far,  far  behind,  the  great  mass  of  mankind. 

This  digression  aside,  to  be  popular,  agreeable  and  en- 
tertaining are  both  aims  and  weapons.  Most  of  us 
would  infinitely  rather  be  liked  than  disliked,  and  with 
some  it  is  a  passion  and  a  weakness.  But  to  be  popular, 
to  be  a  good  fellow,  is  an  extraordinarily  useful  trait 
when  combined  with  firm  purposes  and  good  intelli- 
gence. The  art  of  life  is  to  please,  though  its  business 
is  achievement  and  success,  and  here  the  art  may  fur- 
ther the  business.  Manners,  courtesy  and  certain  of 
the  abilities,  such  as  musical  talent,  story  telling  and 
humor  are  cultivated  largely,  though  not  wholly,  out  of 
the  desire  to  please. 

Manners  and  courtesy  are  really  standardized  meth- 
ods of  behavior,  which  are  to  adjust  us  in  a  pleasing 
way  to  our  superiors,  equals  and  inferiors,  and  to  the 
various  conventional  situations  of  life.  Naturally  these 
will  vary  greatly  in  different  ages  and  different  coun- 
tries. A  democracy  acknowledging  in  theory  no  su- 
periors will  insist  that  every  man  be  called  "  sir  "  and 
every  woman  "  madam,"  whereas  an  aristocracy  laughs 
at  that.  In  reality  there  is  no  democracy  anywhere,  and 
so  we  address  differently  the  woman  of  the  mansion  and 
the  woman  of  the  hovel.  The  mistress  of  the  house 
calls  her  maid  by  her  first  name  but  would  wonder 
what  the  world  is  coming  to  if  the  maid  became  as  fa- 
miliar.    In  a  limited  sense,  manners  and  courtesy  are 


240  THE  FOUNDATIONS  OF  PERSONALITY 

conventional  ways  of  doing  things,  as  the  way  of  liv- 
ing, the  tipping  of  the  hat,  the  form  of  greetings,  the 
way  of  eating,  but  these  conventions  have  great  value  to 
the  majority  of  people  as  evidencing  breeding  and  train- 
ing or  the  lack  (superiority  or  inferiority),  and  also  as 
removing  doubt  and  choice,  so  that  things  run  smoothly 
and  without  contradiction.  In  a  more  noble  sense, 
manners  and  courtesy  prescribe  conduct  in  order  to 
proscribe  offense  to  the  self-valuation  of  others.  Con- 
vention says,  "Address  people  as  if  they  were  your 
equals  at  least ;  don't  contradict  brusquely  because  that 
implies  their  inferiority  or  stupidity;  avoid  too  contro- 
versial topics  since  bitterness  and  humiliation  may  thus 
arise ;  do  not  notice  defects  or  disabilities  for  the  same 
reason;  do  not  brag  or  be  too  conspicuous,  since  to 
boast  of  superiority  is  to  imply  the  inferiority  of  others, 
and  they  will  dislike  you,"  etc.  We  tend  to  dislike  and 
hate  those  who  make  us  feel  inferior,  except  under  those 
special  circumstances  where  sex-love,  awe  and  admira- 
tion enter  to  make  a  certain  inferiority  desirable  or 
befitting.  So  a  large  part  of  manners  and  courtesy  con- 
cern themselves  with  the  formulae  of  conduct  which 
avoid  this  result  to  others,  and  we  are  also  enjoined  to 
conduct  ourselves  so  that  others  will  not  regard  us  as  in- 
ferior. We  speak  of  a  man  as  a  "  low  person  "  if  he 
eats  with  his  knife,  and  very  few  things  so  humiliate 
us  as  the  knowledge  that  we  have  behaved  in  an  un- 
mannerly way.  One  of  the  great  purposes,  then,  is  to 
be  conventional,  to  behave,  dress  and  "  look  "  according 
to  an  accepted  standard,  one  that  is  laid  down  for  age, 
sex  and  social  station.  There  are  people  to  whom  con- 
vention is  truly  almost  holy,  and  true  to  our  principle 
of  variability,  there  are  others  who  hate  convention. 
Because  many  writers  have  shot  shafts  of  satire  and 


THE  EVOLUTION  OF  CHARACTER        241 

ridicule  at  convention  and  custom,  and  because  of  the 
enormous  reading  public,  the  artificial  nature  of  con- 
vention has  been  emphasized  to  that  large  part  of  the 
community  that  desires  to  be  dififerent  merely  for  the 
sake  of  being  different,  and  there  is  built  up  a  conven- 
tional unconventionality.  It  has  become  the  mark  of 
the  artist,  the  great  in  spirit,  to  be  unconventional  (at 
least  in  novels),  and  so  there  are  a  hundred  "uncon- 
ventional "  poseurs  to  one  genuinely  free  in  spirit. 
Anything  that  becomes  a  dogma  or  a  cult  is  not  uncon- 
ventional, for  it  is  the  standard  or  the  custom  of  a 
group.  Most  Bohemians,  so  called,  are  poseurs  and 
conventionalized  to  their  marrow.  And  most  of  the 
really  unconventional  are  "  freaks  ",  "  odd  sticks  "  whose 
grotesque  individualities  cannot  conform.  But  in  the 
mass  of  the  unconventional  one  finds  here  and  there, 
like  nuggets  of  gold  in  sand,  the  true  reformers  of  the 
world. 

The  "  poseurs  "  in  custom  have  their  analogies  in  the 
pompous,  over-dignified  and  over-important;  the  af- 
fected, in  a  word.  Affectation  is  felt  to  be  a  disharmony 
between  the  pose  and  the  inner  values  or  an  attempt  to 
win  superiority  or  "  difference  "  of  a  superior  kind  by 
acting.  In  either  case  it  excites  ridicule,  hatred  or  dis- 
gust, and  shafts  at  it  form  part  of  the  stock  in  trade 
of  the  satirist,  humorist  and  indeed  every  portrayer  of 
life.  What  men  demand  of  each  other  is  sincerity,  and 
even  where  the  insincerity  is  merely  a  habitual  pose 
it  arouses  hostile  feeling  which  expresses  itself  all  the 
way  from  criticism  to  the  overt  act. 

Since  to  feel  superior  is  so  highly  prized  in  social 
relationships  of  all  kinds,  part  of  the  technique  of  those 
seeking  some  advantage  or  other  —  economic,  social,  per- 
sonal —  from  those  who  must  be  influenced  is  to  give 


242  THE  FOUNDATIONS  OF  PERSONALITY 

them  the  feeling  of  superiority.  Flattery,  cajolement, 
humble  supplication  and  the  finer  maneuvers  of  tact, 
all  have  this  in  mind.  These  however  are  palatable  to 
the  intelligent  only  when  felt  to  be  sincere  and  when 
emanating  from  some  one  more  or  less  esteemed,  though 
there  are  plenty  who  "  fall "  for  the  grossest  flattery 
from  almost  any  one,  whose  ego  feeling  is  easily  in- 
flated with  a  corresponding  shrinking  in  judgment  and 
common  sense.  In  the  relations  of  men  and  women, 
flattery  in  one  shape  or  another  plays  an  enormous  rdle 
—  from  the  effect  on  women  of  the  statement  or  implica- 
tion in  a  subtle  or  gross  way  that  they  are  charming, 
and  the  effect  on  men  of  acknowledged  superiority  in 
strength,  courage  or  intelligence.  Of  course,  in  both 
cases  the  effect  is  partly  in  the  physical  attractiveness 
of  the  flatterer  and  tends  to  become  ridiculous  when 
he  or  she  is  without  charm.  The  simpering  language 
that  is  irresistible  when  uttered  by  a  starry-eyed  maid 
of  eighteen  loses  somewhat  in  beauty  and  effect  when 
emanating  from  the  lips  of  bespectacled  forty.  The 
power  to  use  and  the  power  to  resist  flattery  in  any  of 
its  forms  have  played  almost  as  great  a  role  in  the 
history  of  the  race  as  strength,  beauty  or  intelligence. 

It  would  be  futile  to  elaborate  in  detail  the  various 
ways  of  seeking  superiority  or  resisting  inferiority. 
Two  directions  of  this  impulse  need  some  attention,  as 
they  lead  to  personality  traits  of  great  importance. 
"  Having  one's  way  "  becomes  a  dominant  desire  with 
many  people,  and  much  of  the  clashing  that  occurs  in 
families,  organizations  and  the  council  chambers  of  na- 
tions arises  from  a  childish,  egoistic  seeking  of  superior- 
ity. People  enter  into  the  most  heated  and  sterile 
arguments,  often  coming  to  blows,  if  the  course  of  con- 
duct they  desire  to  have  followed  is  modified  or  blocked. 


THE  EVOLUTION  OF  CHARACTER        243 

Even  when  secretly  convinced  that  they  are  wrong,  hus- 
bands and  wives  will  continue  to  insist  on  victory,  for 
too  often  the  domestic  relationship  is  a  struggle  for  lead- 
ership and  dominance  rather  than  a  partnership  and 
a  conference.  Two  heads  are  better  than  one  when 
the  intelligence  within  the  heads  is  of  good  grade  and 
when  the  desire  for  superiority  does  not  take  trivial 
directions.  And  the  effect  of  yielding  to  the  whims  of 
children  is  to  develop  an  irritable,  domineering  egoism 
bent  on  having  its  own  way,  resisting  reasonable  com- 
promise or  correction.  The  greatest  benefit  of  discipline 
and  above  all  of  contact  with  equals  to  a  child  is  in  the 
effect  on  this  phase  of  egoism,  i.  e.,  that  cooperation 
means  compromise;  to  be  reasonable  implies  listening 
with  respect  to  others'  plans  and  to  accept  better  ways 
of  doing  things,  even  if  they  have  originated  with  others ; 
in  other  ways  the  subordinating  of  trivial  egoism. 
The  large  families  of  other  days  offered  the  conflict  of 
wills  and  its  consequent  lesson  within  the  home ;  to-day 
the  solitary  child,  or  the  one  whose  brother  or  sister 
is  three,  four  or  five  years  younger  or  older  must  go  into 
the  streets  to  obtain  this  discipline  or  else  go  without. 
The  indulged  have  this  form  of  inferior  egoism  more 
than  do  those  who  have  been  roughly  handled,  and  so  it 
is  more  common  in  women  of  the  better-to-do  classes 
and  in  men  who  have  always  exercised  authority.  It  is 
of  course  found  in  what  is  known  as  the  stubborn  per- 
son,—  he  whose  will  is  law  to  himself  and  who  seeks 
to  make  it  law  to  others.  Ordinarily  the  stubborn 
person  is  merely  a  nuisance,  but  also,  if  he  couples  that 
stubbornness  with  intelligence  and  some  especial  abil- 
ity, he  may  reach  great  heights,  though  he  is  seldom 
popular. 
A  sub-form  of  having  one's  own  way  is  the  adherence 


244  THE  FOUNDATIONS  OF  PERSONALITY 

to  one's  own  "opinion."  The  clash  of  opinions  is  in 
its  noblest  aspect  the  basis  of  knowledge ;  the  correction 
of  opinion  that  results  when  man  meets  man  is  the 
growth  of  tolerance  and  urbanity.  Wide  reading,  travel 
and  experience  teach  us  that  our  opinions  can  never  be 
absolutely  right,  and  we  grow  to  look  upon  them  in  a 
detached  sort  of  way.  In  fact,  the  prime  result  of  the 
growth  of  intelligence  and  of  experience  is  to  make 
one,  as  it  were,  objective  toward  oneself,  to  view  one's 
own  thoughts,  beliefs  and  emotions  with  some  humor 
and  skepticism.  But  the  uncultured,  the  narrow,  the 
inexperienced,  the  young  and  the  strongly  egotistic 
never  detach  themselves  from  their  opinions,  and  their 
opinions  are  themselves.  Attack  an  opinion,  contradict 
or  amend  it,  —  and  a  sort  of  fighting  spirit  is  aroused. 
Argument  differs  from  discussion  in  that  it  seeks  all 
means  to  win  —  ridicule,  sophistry,  and  personal  attack 
—  and  it  is  by  far  the  more  common.  There  was  a 
time  when  opinion  was  entirely  enslaved,  when  only 
the  ruler  might  venture  on  a  new  belief  or  its  expres- 
sion ;  then  there  came  a  time  when  the  right  to  freedom 
of  opinion  and  its  expression  was  conceded,  and  now, 
with  huge  forces  confronting  one  another,  freedom  of 
opinion^  is  again  threatened.  But  that  is  an  issue 
larger  than  our  subject. 

You  may  judge  a  man  by  his  type  of  argument  and 
his  reaction  to  the  opinions  of  others.  One  should  hold 
to  his  own  beliefs  and  opinions,  but  only  if  they  with- 
stand the  assaults  of  reason.  To  build  ego  feeling  into 
opinions  is  to  make  ignorance  sacred.  For  most  of  us 
there  are  certain  opinions  that  we  will  not  tolerate, 

*The  most  profound  contribution  to  the  subject  of  discussion  and 
freedom  of  opinion  in  recent  years  has  been  written  by  Walter  Lipp- 
man  in  the  Atlantic  Monthly,  September,  1920. 


THE  EVOLUTION  OF  CHARACTER        245 

and  there  are  others  to  which  we  are  indifferent.  There 
are  those  who  feel  it  incumbent  on  themselves  to  con- 
tradict any  opinion,  even  if  they  agree  fundamentally 
with  it.  The  mere  fact  that  some  one  else  gave  it  ut- 
terance arouses  a  sort  of  jealousy.  Then  there  are 
others  who  will  not  permit  any  opinion  of  their  own 
to  be  discussed,  to  whom  it  is  a  personal  affront  to  do 
this.  What  we  call  urbanity  is  tolerance  of  other  opin- 
ions; what  we  call  reasonableness  is  the  willingness  to 
change  opinions  if  convinced.  What  we  call  vacilla- 
tion is  to  have  no  fixed  opinion,  to  be  influenced  at  once 
by  the  opinions  of  others.  The  pleasure  sought  in  argu- 
ment is  a  victory  for  our  opinions  and  thus  for  our- 
selves. 

Here  Montaigne's  wisdom  aptly  expresses  itself :  "  We 
deride  ourselves  a  hundred  times  when  we  mock  our 
neighbor."  He  is  stubborn  and  unreasonable  who  does 
not  agree  with  us.  "  Be  reasonable,"  cry  the  unreason- 
able as  they  argue.  "  How  stubborn  and  pigheaded 
you  are,"  say  those  inaccessible  to  reason.  The  difft- 
culty  in  reaching  a  true  estimate  of  the  world,  ourselves 
and  our  neighbors  lies  in  the  egoism  which  permeates 
our  beliefs  and  opinions. 

A  second  direction  of  the  impulse  to  superiority  is 
personal  beauty.  Not  only  does  the  young  girl  (or  any 
other,  male  or  female)  dress  and  adorn  herself  to  at- 
tract those  whose  good  opinion  she  seeks,  but  also  she 
seeks  superiority  over  her  competitors.  Her  own  self- 
valuation  increases  with  the  admiration  of  some  and 
the  discomfiture  of  others.  To  be  beautiful,  attractive 
or  pretty  becomes  thus  a  goal  to  many  aims  of  the  per- 
sonality ;  it  offers  a  route  to  success  in  obtaining  power, 
riches,  etc. ;  it  yields  the  longed-for  admiration,  and  it 
gives  the  satisfaction  of  superiority.     It  rarely  has  in 


246  THE  FOUNDATIONS  OF  PERSONALITY 

it  any  ideal  of  service  or  of  help,  though  beauty  in  the 
abstract  is  an  ideal  of  high  value.  To  desire  to  be 
beautiful  physically  as  a  leading  aim  usually  leads  to 
selfishness  and  petty  vanity.  As  a  subsidiary  aim  it 
balances  character,  but  unfortunately,  as  we  have  be- 
fore seen,  it  is  inculcated  as  a  primary  aim  early  in  the 
life  of  a  girl.  Time,  men  seek  to  be  beautiful  in  a 
masculine  way,  but  the  goal  of  masculine  beauty  is 
strength,  which  is  directly  serviceable.  This  is  not  to 
say  that  there  are  no  men  who  are  vain  of  their  good 
looks,  for  there  are  many.  But  only  occasionally  does 
one  find  a  man  who  organizes  his  life  efforts  to  be  beau- 
tiful, who  establishes  criteria  of  success  or  failure  on 
complexion,  hair,  features  of  face  and  lines  of  figure. 
So  long,  therefore,  as  woman  can  obtain  power  through 
beauty  and  sex  appeal,  so  long  may  we  expect  a  trivial 
trend  in  her  character. 

We  have  lost  track  of  our  hypothetical  child  in  the 
history  of  his  character  development,  lost  sight  of  him 
as  he  struggles  in  a  morass  of  desires  and  purposes  of 
power,  fellowship  and  superiority.  His  situations  be- 
come still  more  complex  as  we  watch  him  seek  to  unify 
his  life  around  permanent  purposes,  against  a  pestering, 
surging,  recurring,  temporary  desire.  He  desires,  let 
us  say,  to  conform  to  the  restriction  in  sex,  but  as  he 
approaches  adolescence,  within  and  without  stimuli  of 
breathless  ardor  assail  him.  He  must  inhibit  them  if 
he  proposes  to  be  chaste,  and  his  continent  road  is 
beset  with  never-resting  temptations.  He  calls  himself 
a  fool  at  times  for  resisting,  and  his  mind  pictures  the 
delights  he  misses  —  if  not  from  direct  experience,  from 
information  he  gathers  in  books  and  from  those  who 
know  —  and  if  he  yields,  then  self-reproach  embitters 
him.     But  correctly  to  portray  the  situation  is  to  drop 


THE  EVOLUTION  OF  CHARACTER        247 

our  hypothetical  adolescent,  for  here  is  where  individual 
reaction  and  individual  situations  are  too  varied  to  be 
met  with  in  one  case.  Some  do  not  inhibit  their  sex 
desires  at  all ;  others  resist  now  and  then,  others  yield 
occasionally;  still  others  remain  faithful  to  the  ideal. 
Some  drop  the  conventional  ideal  and  replace  with  un- 
conventional substitutes,  some  resist  at  great  cost  to 
themselves,  and  others  find  no  difficulty  in  resisting 
what  is  no  temptation  at  all  to  them.  Passion,  resis- 
tance, opportunity,  training  and  sublimation  differ  as 
remarkably  as  nuns  differ  from  prostitutes. 

A  similar  situation  is  found  in  the  work  purposes. 
To  work  steadily,  with  industry  and  unflagging  effort, 
at  something  perhaps  not  inherently  attractive  is  not 
merely  a  measure  of  energy,  —  it  is  a  measure  of  inhibi- 
tion and  will.  For  there  are  so  many  more  immediate 
pleasures  to  be  had,  even  if  offering  only  variety  and 
relaxation.  There  is  the  country,  there  is  the  lake  for 
fishing;  there  is  the  dance  hall  where  a  pretty  girl 
smiles  as  your  arm  encircles  her  waist;  there  is  the 
ball  field  where  on  a  fine  day  you  may  go  and  forget 
duty  and  strained  effort  in  the  swirl  of  an  enthusiasm 
that  emanates  from  the  thousands  around  you  as  they 
applaud  the  splendid  athletes ;  there  is  the  good  fellow- 
ship and  pleasure  that  beckon  as  you  bend  to  a  task. 
To  shut  these  out,  to  inhibit  the  temporary  "good" 
for  the  permanent  good,  is  the  measure  of  character. 

These  sex  and  work  situations  we  must  take  up  in 
detail  in  separate  chapters.  What  is  important  is  that 
as  life  goes  on,  necessity,  the  social  organization  and 
gradual  concentration  of  energy  canalize  the  purposes, 
reduce  the  power  of  the  irrelevant  and  temporary  de- 
sires. Habit  and  custom  bring  a  person  into  definite 
relationship  with  society;  the  man  becomes  husband, 


248  THE  FOUNDATIONS  OF  PERSONALITY 

father,  worker  in  some  definite  field  of  industry ;  ambi- 
tion becomes  narrowed  down  to  the  possibilities  or  is 
entirely  discarded  as  hopeless.  The  character  becomes 
a  collection  of  habits,  with  some  controlling  purpose 
and  some  characteristic  relaxations.  This  at  least  is 
true  of  the  majority  of  men.  Here  and  there  are  those 
who  have  not  been  able  to  form  a  unification  even  along 
such  simple  lines ;  they  are  without  steady  habits,  dere- 
licts morally,  financially  and  socially,  or  if  with  means 
independent  of  personal  effort  they  are  wastrels  and 
idlers.  And  again  there  are  the  doers  and  thinkers  of 
the  world,  the  fortunate,  whose  lives  are  associated  with 
successful  purposes,  whose  ambitions  grow  and  grow 
until  they  reach  the  power  of  which  they  dreamed. 
There  are  the  reformers  living  in  a  fever  heat  of  pur- 
pose, disdaining  rest  and  relaxation,  dangerously  near 
fanaticism  and  not  far  from  mental  unbalance,  but 
achieving  through  that  unbalance  things  the  balanced 
never  have  the  will  to  attempt.  He  who  works  merely 
to  get  rich  or  powerful  or  to  provide  food  for  his  family 
cannot  understand  the  zealots  who  see  the  world  as  a 
place  where  something  must  happen, —  where  slavery 
must  be  abolished,  women  must  have  votes,  children 
mu^st  go  to  school  until  sixteen,  prostitution  mu^t  dis- 
appear, alcohol  mu^t  be  prohibited,  etc.  Such  people 
miss  the  pretty,  pleasant  relaxing  joys  of  life,  but  they 
gain  in  intensity  of  life  what  they  lose  in  diffuseness. 

This  war  of  the  permanent  unified  purposes  versus 
the  temporary  scattering  desires  —  the  power  of  inhibi- 
tion —  is  involved  in  the  health  and  vigor  of  the  person. 
Disease,  fatigue  and  often  enough  old  age  show  them- 
selves in  lowered  purpose,  in  the  failure  of  the  will  (in 
the  sense  of  the  energy  of  purpose),  in  a  scattering  of 
activity.     Indeed,  in  the  senile  states  one  too  often  sees 


THE  EVOLUTION  OF  CHARACTER        249 

the  disappearance  of  moral  control  where  one  least 
expected  it.  And  one  of  the  greatest  tragedies  of  our 
times  occurred  when  an  elderly  statesman,  on  the  brink 
of  arterial  disease  of  the  brain,  lost  the  strength  and 
firmness  of  purpose  that  hitherto  had  characterized 
him.  One  of  the  worst  features  of  the  government  of 
nations  is  the  predominance  of  old  men  in  the  govern- 
ing bodies.  For  not  only  are  they  apt  to  have  over- 
intellectualized  life,  not  only  have  they  become  special- 
ists in  purpose  and  therefore  narrow,  but  the  atrophy 
of  the  passions  and  desires  of  youth  and  middle  life 
has  rendered  them  unfit  to  legislate  for  the  bulk  of  the 
race,  who  are  the  young  and  middle-aged.  It  is  no  true 
democracy  where  old  age  governs  the  rest  of  the  periods 
of  life. 

Unification  of  purpose  often  goes  too  far.  Men  lose 
sight  of  the  duties  they  owe  to  wife  and  family  in  their 
pursuit  of  wealth  or  fame;  they  forget  that  relaxation 
and  pleasure-seeking  are  normal  and  legitimate  aims. 
^They  deify  a  purpose;  they  attach  it  to  themselves  so 
that  it  becomes  more  essentially  themselves  than  their 
religion  or  their  family.  They  speak  of  their  work  as 
if  every  letter  were  capitalized  and  lose  sympathy  and 
interest  in  the  rest  of  the  wide  striving  world.  Men 
grow  hard,  even  if  philanthropists,  in  too  excessive  a 
devotion  to  a  purpose,  and  soon  it  is  their  master,  and 
they  are  its  slaves.  Happy  is  he  who  can  follow  his 
purpose  efiiciently  and  earnestly,  but  who  can  find  in- 
terest in  many  things,  pleasure  in  the  wide  range  of 
joys  the  world  offers  and  a  youthful  curiosity  and  zest 
in  the  new. 

Every  human  being,  no  matter  how  civilized  and  uni- 
fied, how  modem  and  social  in  his  conduct,  has  within 
him  a  core  of  uncivilized,  disintegrating,  ancient  and 


250  THE  FOUNDATIONS  OF  PERSONALITY 

egoistic  desires  and  purposes.  "  I  feel  two  natures 
struggling  within  me  "  is  the  epitome  of  every  man's 
life.  This  is  what  has  been  called  conflict  by  the  psy- 
choanalysts, and  my  own  disagreement  with  them  is 
that  I  believe  it  to  be  distinctly  conscious  in  the  main. 
A  man  knows  that  the  pretty  young  girls  he  meets  tempt 
him  from  his  allegiance  to  his  wife  and  his  desires  to 
be  good;  a  woman  knows  that  the  prosaic  husband  no 
longer  pleases,  and  why  he  does  not  please,  —  only  if 
you  ask  either  of  them  bluntly  and  directlj'  they  will 
deny  their  difficulties.  The  organic  activities  of  the 
body,  basic  in  desire  of  all  kinds,  are  crude  and  give 
rise  to  crude  forbidden  wishes,  but  the  struggle  that 
goes  on  is  repressed,  rebelled  against  and  gives  rise  to 
trains  of  secondaiy  symptoms,  —  fatigue,  headache,  in- 
digestion, weariness  of  life  and  many  other  complaints. 
It  is  perfectly  proper  to  complain  of  headache,  but  it 
is  a  humiliation  to  say  that  you  have  chosen  wrongly 
in  marriage,  or  that  you  are  essentially  polygamous,  or 
that  an  eight-hour  day  of  work  at  clerking  or  bookkeep- 
ing disgusts  and  bores  you.  People  complain  of  that 
which  is  proper  and  allows  them  to  maintain  self- 
respect,  but  they  hide  that  which  may  lower  them  in 
the  eyes  of  others.  Gain  their  confidence,  show  that 
you  see  deeper  than  their  words  and  you  get  revelations 
that  need  no  psychoanalytic  technique  to  elicit  and 
which  are  distinctly  conscious. 

This  brings  me  to  the  point  that  the  constant  inhibi- 
tion, blocking  and  balking  of  desires  and  wishes,  though 
in  part  socially  necessary  and  ethically  justifiable,  is 
decidedly  wearisome,  at  times  to  all,  and  to  many  at  all 
times.  It  seems  so  easy  and  pleasant  to  relax  in  pur- 
poses, in  morals,  in  thought,  to  be  a  vagrant  spirit  seek- 
ing nothing  but  the  pleasures  right  at  hand ;  to  be  like 


THE  EVOLUTION  OF  CHARACTER       251 

a  traditional  bee  flitting  from  the  rose  to  rose  of  desire. 
( Only  the  bee  is  a  decidedly  purposive  creature,  out  for 
business  not  pleasure. )  "  Why  all  this  striving  and 
self-control  ?  "  cries  the  unorganized  in  all  of  us.  "  Why 
build  up  when  Death  tears  down?  "  cries  the  pessimist 
in  our  hearts.  Great  epochs  in  history  are  marked  by 
different  answers  to  these  questions,  and  in  our  own 
civilization  there  has  grown  up  a  belief  that  bodily 
pleasure  in  itself  is  wrong,  that  life  is  vanity  unless 
yoked  to  service  and  effort.  The  Puritan  idea  that  we 
best  serve  God  in  this  way  has  been  modified  by  a  more 
skeptical  idea  that  we  serve  man  by  swinging  our  efforts 
away  from  bodily  pleasure  and  toward  work,  organized 
to  some  good  end ;  but  essentially  the  idea  of  inhibition, 
control,  as  the  highest  virtue,  remains.  Such  an  ideal 
gains  force  for  a  time,  then  grows  too  wearisome, 
too  extreme,  and  a  generation  grows  up  that  throws  it 
off  and  seeks  pleasure  frankly ;  paints,  powders,  dances, 
sings,  develops  the  art  of  "living,"  indulges  the  sense; 
becomes  loose  in  morals,  and  hyperesthetic  and  over- 
refined  in  tastes.  Then  the  ennui,  boredom  and  disgust 
that  always  follow  sensual  pleasures  become  diffuse; 
happiness  cannot  come  through  the  seeking  of  pleasure 
and  excitement  and  anhedonia  of  the  exhausted  type 
arises.  Preachers,  prophets,  seers  and  poets  vigorously 
proclaim  the  futility  of  pleasure,  and  the  happiness  of 
service;  inhibition  comes  into  its  own  again  and  a 
Puritan  cycle  recommences.  Stoic,  epicurean;  Roman 
republic,  Roman  empire ;  Puritan  England,  Restoration ; 
Victorian  days,  early  twentieth  century;  for  to-day  we 
are  surging  into  an  era  of  revolt  against  form,  custom, 
tradition ;  in  a  word  against  inhibition. 

As  with  periods,  so  with  people ;  self-indulgence,  i.  e., 
indulgence  of  the  passing  desires,  follows  the  idealism 


252  THE  FOUNDATIONS  OF  PERSONALITY 

of  adolescence.  Youth  sows  its  wild  oats.  Then  the 
steadying  purposes  appear  partly  because  the  pleasure 
of  indulgence  passes.  Marriage,  responsibility,  strain- 
ing effort  mark  the  passing  of  ten  or  a  dozen  years ;  then 
in  middle  life,  and  often  before,  things  get  flat  and  with- 
out savor,  monotony  creeps  in  and  a  curiosity  as  to 
the  possibilities  of  pleasure  formerly  experienced  is 
awakened.  (I  believe  that  most  of  the  sexual  unfaith- 
fulness in  men  and  women  over  thirty  springs  not  from 
passion  but  from  curiosity.) 

There  occurs  a  dangerous  age  in  the  late  thirties  and 
early  forties,  one  in  which  self-indulgence  makes  itself 
clamorous.  The  monotony  of  labor,  the  fatigue  of  inhi- 
bition make  themselves  felt,  and  at  this  time  men  (and 
women)  need  to  add  relaxation  and  pleasure  of  a  legiti- 
mate kind.  Golf,  the  fishing  trip,  games  of  all  kinds; 
legitimate  excitement  which  need  not  be  inhibited  is 
necessary.  This  need  of  excitement  without  inhibition 
is  behind  most  of  the  gambling  and  card  playing;  it 
explains  the  extraordinary  attraction  of  the  detective 
story  and  the  thrilling  movies;  it  gives  great  social 
value  to  the  prize  fight  and  the  ball  game  where  you 
may  see  the  staid  and  the  sober  giving  vent  to  an  ex- 
citement that  may  fatigue  them  for  a  time  but  which 
clears  the  way  for  their  next  day's  inhibitions. 

Unfortunately  too  many  mistake  excitement  for  hap- 
piness. The  forms  of  relief  from  inhibition  —  card 
playing,  sports,  the  theater,  the  thrilling  story  and  the 
movie  —  grow  to  be  habits  and  lose  their  exciting  value. 
They  can  give  no  permanent  relief  from  the  pain  of 
repression;  only  a  philosophy  of  life  can  do  that.  A 
philosophy  of  life !  One  might  write  a  few  volumes  on 
that  (and  there  are  so  many  great  philosophers  already 
on  the  market),  and  yet  such  a  philosophy  would  only 


THE  EVOLUTION  OF  CHARACTER       253 

state  that  strenuous  purpose  must  alternate  with  quiet 
relaxation;  excitement  is  to  be  sought  only  at  periods 
and  never  for  any  length  of  time ;  relief  from  inhibitions 
can  only  be  found  in  legitimate  ways  or  self-reproach 
enters.  Play,  sports,  short  frequent  vacations  rather 
than  long  ones,  freedom  from  ceremony  as  a  rule  —  but 
now  and  then  a  full  indulgence  in  ceremonials  —  and  a 
realization  that  there  is  no  freedom  in  self-indulgence. 

I  remember  one  Puritanically  bred  young  woman 
who  fled  from  her  restrictions  and  inhibitions  and  joined 
a  "  free  love  "  colony  in  New  York.  After  two  years 
she  left  them  and  came  back  to  New  England.  Her 
statement  of  the  situation  she  found  herself;  it  sum- 
marizes all  attempts  at  "  freedom."  "  It  wasn't  free- 
dom. You  found  yourself  bound  to  your  desires,  a 
slave  to  every  wish.  It  grew  awfully  tiresome  and  be- 
sides, it  brought  so  many  complications.  Sometimes 
you  loved  where  you  weren't  loved  —  and  vice  versa. 
Jealousy  was  there,  oh,  so  much  of  it  —  and  pleasure 
disappeared  after  a  while.  It  wasn't  conscience  —  I 
still  believe  that  right  and  wrong  are  arbitrary  matters 
—  but  I  found  myself  envying  people  who  had  some 
guide,  some  belief,  some  restrictions  in  themselves! 
For  it  seemed  to  me  they  were  more  free  than  I." 

The  fact  is,  for  most  men  and  women  inhibition  is 
no  artificial  phenomenon,  despite  its  burdensomeness. 
It  is  not  only  inevitable,  it  is  desirable.  A  feeling  of 
power  appears  when  one  resists;  there  is  mental  gain, 
character  growth  as  a  result.  Life  must  be  purposive 
else  it  is  vain  and  futile,  and  the  feeling  of  no  achieve- 
ment and  failure  is  far  more  disastrous  than  a  thou- 
sand inhibitions. 

Though  man  battles  and  compromises  with  himself, 
he  also  battles  and  compromises  with  his  fellows  and 


254  THE  FOUNDATIONS  OF  PERSONALITY 

circumstances.  That  is  to  say,  he  must  continually  ad- 
just himself  to  the  unforeseen,  the  obstacle,  the  favoring 
circumstance;  the  possible  and  impossible;  the  certain 
and  uncertain.  Adjustment  to  reality  is  what  the  neu- 
rologists call  it,  but  they  do  not  define  reality,  which 
indeed  cannot  be  defined.  It  is  not  the  same  thing  for 
any  two  persons.  For  some  reality  is  success,  for 
others  it  is  virtue.  The  scientist  smiles  at  the  reality 
of  the  love-sick  girl,  and  she  would  think  his  reality  a 
bad  dream.  The  artist  says,  "  Beauty  is  the  reality  " ; 
the  miser  says,  "  Cash  " ;  the  sentimentalist  answers, 
"  None  of  this  but  Love  " ;  and  the  philosopher,  aloof 
from  all  these,  defines  reality  as  "  Truth."  And  the 
skeptic  asks,  "What  is  Truth?"  We  gain  nothing  by 
saying  a  man  must  adjust  himself  to  reality;  we  say 
something  definite  when  we  say  he  must  adjust  his 
wishes  to  his  abilities,  to  the  opposing  wills,  wishes 
and  abilities  of  others ;  to  the  needs  of  his  family  and  his 
country;  to  disease,  old  age  and  death;  to  the  flux  of 
the  river  of  life.  In  the  quickness  of  adjustment  we 
have  a  great  character  factor;  in  the  farsightedness  of 
adjustment  (foreseeing,  planning)  we  have  another. 
Does  a  man  take  his  dififlculties  with  courage  and  good 
cheer,  does  he  make  the  "  best  of  it  "  or  is  he  plunged 
into  doubt  and  indecision  by  obstacles  or  complications? 
Is  he  calm,  cool,  collected,  well  poised,  in  that  he 
watches  and  works  without  too  much  emotion  and  main- 
tains self -feeling  against  adversity?  We  say  a  man  is 
self-reliant  when  he  finds  in  himself  resources  against 
obstacles  and  does  not  call  on  his  neighbors  for  help. 
We  would  do  well  to  extend  the  term  to  the  one  whose 
fund  of  courage,  hope,  energy  and  resource  springs 
largely  from  within  himself ;  who  resists  the  forces  that 
reduce  courage,  hope  and  energy.     A  higher  sort  of 


THE  EVOLUTION  OF  CHARACTER       255 

man  not  only  supplies  himself  with  the  energetic  fac- 
tors of  character,  but  he  inspires,  as  we  say,  others;  he 
is  a  sort  of  bank  of  these  qualities,  with  high  reserves 
which  he  gives  to  others.  Contrast  him  with  those 
whose  cry  constantly  is  "  Help,  help."  Charming  they 
may  be  as  ornaments,  but  they  deplete  the  treasury  of 
life  for  their  associates  and  are  only  of  value  as  they 
call  out  the  altruism  of  others. 

There  is  no  formula  for  adjustment.  Intelligence, 
insight  into  one's  powers  and  capacities,  caution,  bold- 
ness, compromise,  firmness,  aggressiveness,  tact, — 
these  and  a  dozen  other  traits  and  qualities  come  into 
play.  It  is  a  favorite  teaching  of  optimistic  sentimen- 
talists, "  Will  conquers  everything  —  it  is  omnipotent." 
God's  will  is,  —  but  no  one  else's.  What  happens  when 
two  will  and  pray  for  diametrically  opposing  results? 
"  Then  God  is  on  the  side  of  the  heaviest  battalions," 
said  Napoleon.  Victory  comes  to  the  best  prepared,  the 
most  intelligent,  the  least  hampered  and  the  luckiest. 
Outside  of  metaphysics  and  theology  there  is  no  abstract 
will;  it  is  a  part  of  purpose,  intelligence  and  instinct 
and  shares  in  their  imperfections  and  limitations.  To 
will  the  impossible  is  to  taste  failure,  although  it  may 
be  diflflcult  to  know  what  is  impossible.  Fight  hard, 
be  brave,  keep  your  powder  dry  and  have  good  friends 
is  the  best  counsel  for  adjustment.  But  learn  resigna- 
tion and  cultivate  a  sense  of  humor. 

No  inspiration  in  that?  Well,  I  must  leave  inspira- 
tion to  others  who  have  an  infallible  formula.  The  best 
I  can  offer  in  adjustment  is  the  old  prayer,  "  Lord, 
make  me  love  the  chase  and  not  the  quarry!  Lord, 
make  me  live  up  to  my  ideals !  " 

Out  of  the  welter  of  conflicts  into  which  the  individ- 
ual is  plunged  through  his  own  nature  and  the  nature 


256  THE  FOUNDATIONS  OF  PERSONALITY 

of  the  life  around  him,  out  of  the  experience  of  the  race 
and  the  teaching  of  its  leaders  come  ideals.  Good, 
Beauty,  Justice,  —  these  are  good  deeds,  beautiful 
things,  true  and  non-contradictory  expressions,  just  acts 
raised  to  the  divine  and  absolute,  and  therefore  wor- 
shiped. And  their  opposite,  arising  from  evil  deeds, 
ugly  and  disgusting  things,  misleading  experiences  and 
suffering,  become  unified  into  various  forms  of  Evil. 
Life  becomes  divided  into  two  parts.  Good  and  Evil, 
and  personified  (by  the  great  majority)  into  God  and 
the  Devil.  Man  seeks  the  Good,  hates  Evil,  esteems 
himself  when  he  conforms  to  the  ideal,  loathes  himself 
when  he  violates  it.  He  cannot  judge  himself ;  he  wishes 
to  know  the  judgment  of  others  and  accepts  or  rejects 
that  judgment. 

We  say  man  seeks  pleasure,  satisfaction,  the  Good. 
True.  But  it  is  important  to  know  that  essentially  he 
seeks  a  higher  self-valuation,  seeks  to  establish  his  own 
dignity  and  worth  and  has  his  highest  satisfaction  when 
that  valuation  is  reached  through  conformity  with  ab- 
solute standards. 


CHAPTER  XII 

THE  METHODS  OF  PURPOSE  —  WORK  CHARACTERS 

Having  asked  concerning  any  person,  "  What  are  his 
purposes?  "  whether  of  power  or  fellowship,  whether 
permanent  or  transitory,  whether  adjustable  or  not,  we 
next  ask,  "  How  does  he  seek  their  fulfillment?  " 

"  He  who  wills  the  end  wills  the  means  "  is  an  old 
saying,  but  men  who  will  the  same  end  may  will  differ- 
ent means.  There  have  been  those  who  used  assassina- 
tion to  bring  about  reform,  and  there  are  plenty  who 
use  philanthropy  to  hasten  their  egoistic  aims.  The 
nihilist  who  throws  a  bomb  to  bring  about  an  altruistic 
state  is  own  cousin  to  the  ward  heeler  who  gives  coal  to 
his  poor  constituents  so  that  his  grafting  rule  may  con- 
tinue. 

1.  There  are  those  who  use  the  direct  route  of  force 
to  reach  their  goal  of  desire  and  purpose.  They  attempt 
to  make  no  nice  adjustments  of  their  wishes  to  the 
wishes  of  others ;  the  obstacle,  whether  human  or  other- 
wise must  get  out  of  their  way  or  be  forcibly  removed 
or  destroyed.  "  A  straight  line  is  the  shortest  distance 
between  two  points,"  and  there  is  only  one  absolute 
law,  —  "  the  good  old  rule,  the  simple  plan  that  they 
may  take  who  have  the  power  and  they  may  keep  who 
can."  The  individuals  who  react  this  way  to  obstacles 
are  choleric,  passionate,  egoistic  and  in  the  last  analysis 
somewhat  brutal.  This  is  especially  true  if  they  seek 
force  at  first,  for  with  nearly  all  of  us  extreme  provoca- 
tion or  desperation  brings  direct-action  measures. 


258  THE  FOUNDATIONS  OF  PERSONALITY 

Conspicuously  those  accustomed  to  arbitrary  power 
use  this  method.  They  have  grown  accustomed  to  be- 
lieving that  their  will  or  wish  is  a  cause,  able  to  remove 
obstacles  of  all  kinds.  When  at  all  opposed  the  angry 
reaction  is  extreme,  and  they  tend  to  violence  at  once. 
The  old-fashioned  home  was  modeled  in  tyranny,  and 
the  force  reaction  of  the  father  and  husband  to  his  chil- 
dren and  wife  was  sanctioned  by  law  and  custom.  The 
attitude  of  the  employer  to  employee,  universally  in  the 
past  and  still  prominent,  was  that  of  the  master,  able  in 
ancient  times  to  use  physical  punishment  and  in  our 
day  to  cut  off  a  man's  livelihood  if  he  showed  any  rebel- 
lion. In  a  larger  social  way  War  is  crude  brute  force, 
and  those  who  delude  themselves  that  the  God  of  victory 
is  a  righteous  God  have  read  history  with  a  befoozled 
mind.  Force,  though  the  world  rests  on  it,  is  a  terrible 
weapon  and  engenders  brutality  in  him  who  uses  it  and 
rebellion,  hate  and  humiliation  in  him  upon  whom  it  is 
used.  It  is  an  insult  to  the  dignity  and  worth  of  the 
human  being.  It  must  be  used  for  disciplining  purposes 
only,  —  on  children,  on  the  criminal,  and  then  more 
to  restrain  than  to  punish.  It  cannot  disappear  from 
the  world,  but  it  should  be  minimized.  Only  the  senti- 
mentalized believe  it  can  disappear  entirely,  only  the 
brutal  rejoice  in  its  use.  Force  is  a  crude  way  of  assert- 
ing and  obtaining  superiority ;  the  gentle  hate  to  use  it, 
for  it  arouses  their  sympathy  for  their  opponent.  Who- 
ever preaches  force  as  the  first  weapon  in  any  struggle  is 
either  deluded  as  to  its  value  or  an  enemy  of  mankind. 

As  a  non-inhibited  response,  force  and  brutality  ap- 
pear in  the  mentally  sick.  General  paresis,  cerebral 
arterio-sclerosis,  alcoholic  psychoses  present  classical  ex- 
amples of  the  impatient  brutal  reaction,  often  in  men 
hitherto  patient  and  gentle. 


THE  METHODS  OF  PURPOSE  259 

2.  Strategy  or  cunning  appears  as  a  second  great 
method  of  obtaining  the  fulfillment  of  one's  purposes. 
We  all  use  strategy  in  the  face  of  superior  or  equal 
power,  just  as  we  tend  to  use  force  confronted  by  in- 
feriority. There  is  of  course  a  legitimate  use  of  cunning, 
but  there  is  also  an  anti-social  trend  to  it,  quite  evident 
in  those  who  by  nature  or  training  are  schemers.  The 
strategist  in  love,  war  or  business  simulates  what  he 
does  not  feel,  is  not  frank  or  sincere  in  his  statements 
and  believes  firmly  that  the  end  justifies  the  means.  He 
uses  the  indirect  force  of  the  lie,  the  slander,  insinua- 
tion —  he  has  no  aversion  to  flattery  and  bribery  —  he 
uses  spies  and  false  witnesses.  He  is  a  specialist  in 
the  unexpected  and  seeks  to  lull  suspicion  and  disarms 
watchfulness,  waiting  for  the  moment  to  strike.  Some- 
times he  weaves  so  tangled  a  web  that  he  falls  into  it 
himself,  and  one  of  the  stock  situations  in  humor,  the 
novel  and  the  stage  is  where  the  cunning  schemer  falls 
into  the  pit  he  has  dug  for  others.  In  his  highest  as- 
pect he  is  the  diplomat;  in  his  lowest  he  is  the  sneak. 
People  who  are  weak  or  cowardly  tend  to  the  use  of 
these  methods,  but  also  there  is  a  group  of  the  strong 
who  hate  direct  force  and  rather  like  the  subtler  weap- 
ons. 

The  strategist  tends  to  be  quite  cynical,  and  his  effect 
on  his  fellow  men  is  to  increase  cynicism  and  pessimism. 
They  who  have  suffered  through  the  schemer  grow  to 
suspect  their  fellows  under  any  guise.  They  become 
suspicious  and  hard,  determined  never  to  trust  any  one 
again.  Indeed,  practical  wisdom  to  a  large  extent  is 
the  wisdom  of  strategy  and  is  full  of  mottoes  and  prov- 
erbs inculcating  non-generous  ideals.  When  people 
have  been  "  fooled  "  or  misled,  the  most  valuable  of  the 
social  cementing  qualities,  faith  in  one's  fellows,  is 


260  THE  FOUNDATIONS  OF  PERSONALITY 

weakened.  Despite  the  disintegrating  effect  of  un- 
scrupulous shrewdness,  it  is  common  enough  to  hear 
men  say  of  a  successful  votary  of  the  art,  "  Well,  I  give 
him  credit.  He  is  a  very  clever  fellow,  and  he  has 
brought  home  the  bacon."  Success  is  so  highly  prized 
and  admired  that  the  means  of  obtaining  it  becomes  sec- 
ondary in  the  eyes  of  the  majority. 

3.  The  r61e  of  speech  in  the  relationships  of  human 
beings  is  of  course  too  great  to  be  over-estimated.  Speech 
becomes  the  prime  weapon  in  swaying  and  molding  the 
opinions  and  acts  of  others.  It  is  the  medium  of  the 
threat  of  force  and  the  stratagem  of  cunning,  but  also  it 
enters  human  life  as  the  medium  of  persuasion  and  con- 
viction. The  speech  ability,  the  capacity  to  use  words 
in  attaining  purpose,  shows  as  striking  variations  as 
any  other  capacity. 

Though  a  function  of  intelligence,  the  power  to  speak 
(and  write)  convincingly  and  easily,  is  not  at  all  related 
to  other  phases  of  intelligence.  Though  it  can  be  cul- 
tivated, good  verbalism  is  an  innate  ability,  and  a  most 
valuable  one.  The  power  to  speak  clearly  so  as  to  ex- 
press what  is  on  one's  own  mind  is  uncommon,  as  any 
one  can  testify  who  has  watched  people  struggling  to 
express  themselves.  "  You  know  "  is  a  very  frequent 
phrase  in  the  conversation  of  the  average  man,  and  he 
means  that,  "  My  words  are  inadequate,  but  you  know 
what  I  mean."  The  delight  in  the  good  writer  or  speaker 
is  that  he  relieves  other  people's  dissatisfaction  in  their 
own  inadequate  expression  by  saying  what  they  yearn 
to  say  for  themselves,  thus  giving  them  a  vicarious 
achievement. 

But  the  power  of  clear  expression  is  not  at  all  the 
power  of  persuasion,  although  it  may  be  a  part  of  it. 
One  may  clearly  express  himself  and  antagonize  others. 


THE  METHODS  OF  PURPOSE  261 

The  persuader  seeks  to  discover  the  obstacles  to  agree- 
ment with  him  in  the  minds  of  others  and  to  remove  or 
nullify  them.  He  may  seek  to  do  this  by  a  clear  exposi- 
tion of  his  wishes  and  desires,  by  showing  how  these  will 
benefit  the  others  (or  at  least  not  harm  them),  by  meet- 
ing logically  or  otherwise  the  objections  and  demon- 
strating their  futility.  This  he  will  attempt,  if  he  is 
wise  and  practical,  only  in  a  limited  group  or  among 
those  who  are  keen-minded  and  open  to  reason.  Even 
with  them  he  will  have  to  kindle  and  maintain  their 
interest,  and  he  must  arouse  a  favorable  emotional  state. 

This  latter  is  the  principal  goal  in  persuasion.  Every 
good  speaker  or  writer  who  seeks  to  reach  the  mass  of 
people  needs  the  effect  of  the  great  feelings  —  of  patri- 
otism, sympathy  and  humor  —  needs  flattery,  gross  or 
subtle,  makes  people  laugh  or  smile  or  feel  kindly  dis- 
posed to  him  before  he  attempts  to  get  their  cooperation. 
He  must  place  himself  on  their  level,  be  regarded  as  one 
of  them ;  fellowship  and  the  cooperative  tendencies  must 
be  awakened  before  logic  will  have  value. 

The  persuader  cuts  his  cloth  to  suit  his  case.  He  is  a 
psychologist  of  the  intuitive  type.  He  may  thunder  and 
scold  if  he  finds  in  his  audience,  whether  numbering  one 
or  a  million,  a  tendency  to  yield  to  authority,  and  he 
then  poses  as  that  authority,  handing  out  his  dicta  in 
an  awe-inspiring  fashion.  He  will  awaken  the  latent 
trend  to  ridicule  and  scoffing  by  pointing  out  inconsist- 
ency in  others,  or  he  may  awaken  admiration  for  his 
fairness  and  justice  by  lauding  his  opponent,  taking  care 
not  to  overdo  it. 

Persuasion  is  often  a  part  of  scheming,  rarely  is  it 
used  by  the  forceful,  except  in  the  authoritative  way 
or  to  arouse  anger  against  the  opponent.  It  is  the 
weapon  of  those  who  believe  in  democracy,  for  all  ex- 


262  THE  FOUNDATIONS  OF  PERSONALITY 

position  has  persuasion  as  its  motive.  A  statement  must 
not  only  be  true  to  others,  —  to  the  mass.  Therefore 
persuasion  as  applied  to  the  great  mass  of  people  is 
rarely  closely  knit  or  a  fine  exposition  of  truth  and  his- 
torical evolution ;  that  one  must  leave  for  the  highbrow 
book  or  treatise.  It  is  passionate  and  pleading ;  it  thun- 
ders and  storms;  it  has  wit  and  humor;  it  deals  with 
symbols  and  analogies,  it  plays  on  the  words  of  truth, 
justice,  ideals,  patriotism.  It  may  be  honest  and  truth- 
ful, but  it  cannot  be  really  accurate  or  of  high  intel- 
lectual value. 

And  the  persuasion  that  seeks  private  ends  from  pri- 
vate audiences  "  sizes  "  up  its  audience  as  a  preliminary. 
The  capacity  to  understand  others  and  to  sway  them,  to 
impress  them  according  to  their  make-up,  is  a  trait  of 
great  importance  for  success  or  failure.  It  needs  culti- 
vation, but  often  it  depends  on  a  native  sociability,  a 
friendliness  and  genuine  interest,  on  a  "  good  nature  " 
that  is  what  it  literally  purports  to  be, —  good  nature. 
Though  many  of  the  persuasive  kind  are  insincere  and 
selfish,  I  believe  that  on  the  whole  the  taciturn  and  gruff 
are  less  interested  in  their  fellows  than  the  talkative 
and  cordial. 

The  persuasive  person  has  a  touch  of  the  fighting 
spirit  in  the  trait  called  aggressiveness.  He  is  rarely 
shy  or  retiring.  To  do  well,  he  must  be  prepared  for 
rebuffs,  and  he  is  possessed  of  a  species  of  courage  and 
resistance  against  refusal  and  humiliation.  In  the  high- 
est form  the  persuader  is  a  teacher  and  propagandist, 
changing  the  policy  of  peoples;  in  the  commonest  form 
he  is  a  salesman,  seeking  to  sell  a  commodity;  in  the 
lowest  he  is  the  faker,  trying  to  hoodwink  the  credulous. 

4.  The  strong,  the  crafty,  the  talkers  each  seek  fulfill- 
ment of  purpose  from  an  equal  or  higher  level  than  their 


THE  METHODS  OF  PURPOSE  263 

fellows.  But  power  and  fulfillment  may  be  reached  at 
from  a  lower  level,  from  the  beggar's  position,  from  the 
place  of  weakness.  There  are  some  whose  existence  de- 
pends upon  the  response  given  to  their  supplications, 
who  throw  themselves  directly  on  the  charity  and  tender- 
heartedness of  society.  Inefficient,  incapable  of  sepa- 
rate existence,  this  parasitic  class  is  known  to  eveiy 
social  service  group,  to  every  rich  or  powerful  man  who 
helps  at  least  in  part  to  maintain  them.  I  do  not  mean 
those  who  are  physically  or  intellectually  unable  to  cope 
with  the  world ;  these  are  merely  unfortunate.  I  mean 
those  whose  energy  and  confidence  is  so  low,  or  whose 
lack  of  pride  is  such  that  they  are  willing  to  ask  for 
help  continually  rather  than  make  their  own  way. 

There  is,  however,  a  very  interesting  type  of  person 
who  uses  weakness  as  a  weapon  to  gain  a  purpose,  not 
support.  The  tears  of  many  women  have  long  been 
recognized  as  potent  in  that  warfare  that  goes  on  be- 
tween the  sexes;  the  melting  of  opposition  to  the  whim 
or  wish  when  this  manifestation  of  weakness  is  used  is 
an  old  story.  The  emotional  display  renders  the  man 
uncomfortable,  it  disturbs  him,  he  fears  to  increase  it 
lest  the  opponent  become  sick,  his  conscience  reproaches 
him,  and  he  yields  rather  than  "  make  a  fuss."  Tears 
can  be  replaced  by  symptoms  of  a  hysteric  nature.  I  do 
not  mean  that  these  symptoms  are  caused  by  the  effort 
to  win,  but  they  become  useful  and  are  made  habitual. 
Nor  is  this  found  only  in  woman ;  after  an  accident  there 
are  men  in  plenty  whose  symptoms  play  a  r61e  in  secur- 
ing compensation  for  themselves,  not  necessarily  as 
malingerers.  It  is  in  human  nature  to  desire  the  sym- 
pathy of  others,  and  in  some  cases  this  sympathy  is 
sought  because  through  sympathy  some  other  good  will 
be  forthcoming,  —  a  new  dress,  a  lump  sum  of  money, 


264  THE  FOUNDATIONS  OF  PERSONALITY 

or  merely  securing  one's  own  way.  Very  noticeably  do 
children  tend  to  injure  themselves  if  crossed;  anger 
tends  to  turn  on  itself,  and  the  effect  on  the  other  party 
is  soon  realized,  and  often  utilized.  A  child  may  strike 
its  head  against  the  floor  without  any  other  motive  than 
that  arising  from  hopeless  anger,  but  if  this  brings  the 
parents  to  their  knees,^  the  association  is  made  and  the 
experience  becomes  part  of  the  working  technique  of 
the  child. 

5.  There  is  in  man  an  urge  to  activity  independent  of 
reward  save  in  the  satisfaction  that  comes  from  that 
activity.  This  current  is  organized  into  work,  and  the 
goal  becomes  achievement.  The  most  powerful  factor  in 
discharging  the  energies  of  man  is  the  desire  for  achieve- 
ment. Wealth,  superiority,  power,  philanthropy, 
renown,  safety  and  pleasure  enormously  reinforce  this 
purpose,  but  behind  the  good  work  of  the  world  is  the 
passion  to  create,  to  make  something,  to  mold  the  resist- 
ing forces  of  nature  into  usefulness  and  beauty.  Handi- 
craftsman, artist,  farmer,  miner,  housewife,  writer,  — 
all  labor  contradicts  the  legend  that  work  is  a  curse. 
To  gain  by  work,  to  obtain  desires  through  labor,  is  a 
method  of  attainment  that  is  a  natural  ideal  of  man. 

This  makes  opportune  a  discussion  of  the  work-traits. 
Since  ours  is  an  industrial  society,  in  which  the  work 
of  a  member  is  his  means  of  obtaining  not  only  respect, 
but  a  living,  these  traits  are  largely  those  by  which  he 
is  judged  and  by  which  he  judges  himself. 

Since  work  for  some  is  their  life  and  for  others  their 
means  of  obtaining  a  living,  it  is  obvious  that  the  work- 
traits  may  be  all  the  traits  of  the  individual,  or  only  a 

^Thi3  turning  of  anger  upon  itself  is  a  factor  in  self-destruction. 
It  is  seen,  so  the  naturalists  say,  in  the  snake  and  the  asp,  and  it  is 
common  in  human  relations. 


THE  METHODS  OF  PURPOSE  265 

few  of  them.  Certain  traits  are  especially  important, 
and  to  these  we  must  limit  ourselves. 

The  energy  of  the  individual.  Some  are  so  con- 
stituted that  they  can  constantly  discharge  their  energy 
at  a  high  rate.  These  are  the  dynamics,  the  hyperkin- 
etic, the  Rooseveltian  —  strenuous  —  the  busy  people, 
always  able  to  do  more.  The  modern  American  life 
holds  this  type  as  an  ideal,  though  it  is  quite  question- 
able whether  these  rather  over-busy  people  do  not  lose 
in  reflective  and  creative  ability.  The  rushing  stream 
turns  the  wheels  of  the  mills,  but  it  is  too  strenuous  for 
stately  ships.  This  type  however  achieves  things,  is 
seen  often  in  the  fine  executive  and  usually  needs  no 
urging. 

There  is  another  fine  type  not  so  well  adapted  to  our 
civilization,  which  is  easily  exhausted,  but  can  accom- 
plish very  much  in  a  short  time;  in  other  words  dis- 
charges energy  intermittently  at  a  high  rate.  Charles 
Darwin  was  of  this  kind  —  intermittently  hyperkinetic 
—  obliged  to  rest  after  an  hour's  labor,  but  by  under- 
standing this,  willing  to  rest.  Unfortunately,  unless 
one  is  a  genius  or  rich,  industry  does  not  make  allow- 
ances for  this  type.  Industry  is  organized  on  steadiness 
of  energy  discharge,  —  eight  hours  every  day,  six  days 
a  week. 

The  commonest  type  is  the  "  average  "  person  who  is 
capable  of  moderately  intense  but  constant  activity. 
This  is  the  steady  man  and  woman;  it  is  upon  this 
steadiness  that  the  whole  factory  —  shop  system  —  is 
based.  That  this  steadiness  deadens,  injures  vivacity 
and  makes  for  restlessness,  is  another  matter. 

A  distinctly  pathological  type  is  found  in  some  feeble- 
minded and  some  high  mentalities.  This  unfortunate 
discharges  energy  at  a  low  rate  is  slow  in  action  and 


266  THE  FOUNDATIONS  OF  PERSONALITY 

often  intermittent  as  well  as  hypokinetic.  The  loafer 
and  the  tramp  are  of  this  type.  Around  the  water  front 
of  the  seaports  one  can  find  the  finest  specimens  who  do 
odd  jobs  for  as  much  as  will  pay  for  lodging  and  food 
and  drink.  Perhaps  the  order  of  the  desired  rewards 
should  be  reversed.  Every  village  furnishes  individuals 
of  this  group,  either  unable  or  unwilling  to  work  con- 
secutively or  with  energy.  Often  purposeless  day- 
dreamers  or  else  bereft  of  normal  human  mentality, 
these  are  the  chronically  unemployed  of  our  social- 
industrial  system. 

It  must  be  remembered  that  to  work  steadily  every 
day  and  in  the  same  place  is  not  an  innate  circumstance 
of  man's  life.  For  the  untold  centuries  before  he  de- 
veloped into  an  agriculturist  and  a  handicraftsman,  he 
sought  his  food  and  his  protection  in  the  simplest  way 
and  with  little  steady  labor.  Whether  as  hunter  or 
fisher  or  nomad  herdsman,  he  lived  in  the  open  air,  slept 
in  caves  or  in  rudely  constructed  shelters  and  knew  noth- 
ing of  those  purposes  that  keep  men  working  from 
morning  till  night.  It's  a  long  way  from  primitive  man 
and  his  occupations,  with  their  variety  and  their  relaxa- 
tions, to  the  factory  hand,  shut  up  in  a  shop  all  day  and 
doing  just  one  thing  year  in  and  year  out,  to  the  house- 
wife with  her  multitudinous,  never-ending  tasks  within 
four  walls,  to  the  merchant  engrossed  with  profit  and 
loss,  weighing,  measuring,  buying,  selling  and  worrying 
without  cessation.  The  burden  of  steadiness  in  labor 
is  new  to  the  race,  and  it  is  only  habit,  necessity  and 
social  valuation  that  keeps  most  men  to  their  wheel. 

We  would,  I  think,  be  oversentimental  in  our  treat- 
ment of  this  subject  if  we  omitted  two  hugely  important 
factors  in  work  character.     Two  powerful  motives  op- 


THE  METHODS  OF  PURPOSE  267 

erate,  —  the  necessity  of  working  and  work  as  an  escape 
from  ourselves. 

Not  much  need  be  said  of  the  pressure  of  necessity. 
"  To  eat  one  must  work."  This  sentence  condenses  the 
threat  behind  most  of  the  workers  of  the  world.  They 
cannot  stop  if  they  would  —  for  few  are  those,  even  in 
prosperous  communities,  who  have  three  months  of  idle- 
ness in  their  savings.  The  feeling  of  insecurity  this  fact 
brings  makes  a  nightmare  out  of  the  lives  of  the  many, 
for  to  the  poor  worker  the  charity  organization  is  part 
of  the  penalty  to  be  paid  for  sickness  or  unemployment. 
To  my  mind  there  are  few  things  more  pathetic  than 
a  good  man  out  of  a  job,  and  few  things  for  which  our 
present  society  can  be  so  heartily  damned.  Few  even 
of  the  middle  class  can  rest ;  their  way  of  living  leaves 
them  little  reserve,  and  so  they  plug  along,  with  neces- 
sity as  the  spur  to  their  industry. 

To  escape  oui*selves!  Put  any  person  of  adult 
age,  or  younger,  in  a  room  with  nothing  to  do  but  think, 
and  you  reduce  him  to  abject  misery  and  restlessness. 
Most  of  our  reading,  entertainment,  has  this  object,  and 
if  necessity  did  not  spur  men  on  to  work  steadily,  the 
tedium  of  their  own  thoughts  would.  To  reflect  is 
pleasant  only  to  a  few,  and  the  need  of  a  task  is  the 
need  of  the  average  human  being.  Perhaps  once  upon 
a  time  in  some  idyllic  age,  some  fabled  age  of  innocence, 
time  passed  pleasantly  without  work.  To-day,  work  is 
the  prime  way  of  killing  time,  adding  therefore  to  its 
functions  of  organizing  activity,  achievement  and  social 
value  of  recreation. 

Yet  contradictory  as  it  seems,  though  many  of  us 
love  work  for  its  own  sake,  most  of  us  do  not  love  our 
own  work.     That  is  because  few  of  us  choose  our  work; 


268  THE  FOUNDATIONS  OF  PERSONALITY 

it  is  thrust  upon  us.    Happy  is  he  who  has  chosen  and 
chosen  wisely! 

Industry,  energy,  steadiness  are  parts  of  the  work- 
equipment;  enthusiasm,  eagerness,  the  love  of  work,  in 
short,  is  another  part.  Love  of  work  is  not  a  unitary 
character;  it  is  a  resultant  of  many  forces  and  motives. 
Springing  from  the  love  of  activity,  it  receives  its  direc- 
tion from  ambition  and  is  reinforced  by  success  and 
achievement.  Few  can  continue  to  love  a  work  at  which 
they  fail,  for  self-love  is  injured  and  that  paralyzes  the 
activity.  Here  and  there  is  some  one  who  can  love  his 
work,  even  though  he  is  half -starved  as  a  result,  —  a 
poet,  a  novelist,  an  inventor,  a  scientist,  but  these  dream 
and  hope  for  better  things.  But  the  bulk  of  the  half- 
starved  labor  of  the  world,  half-starved  literally  as  well 
as  symbolically,  has  no  light  of  hope  ahead  of  it  and 
cannot  love  the  work  that  does  not  offer  a  reward.  It 
is  easy  for  those  who  reap  pleasure  and  reward  from 
their  labors  to  sing  of  the  joy  of  work;  business  man, 
professional  man,  artist,  handicraftsman,  farmer,  — 
these  may  find  in  the  thing  they  do  the  satisfaction  of 
the  creative  desires  and  the  reward  of  seeing  their 
product;  but  the  factory  is  a  Frankenstein  delivering 
huge  masses  of  products  but  eating  up  the  producers. 
The  more  specialized  it  becomes  the  less  each  man 
creates  of  the  unit,  machine  or  ornament;  the  less  he 
feels  of  achievement.  Go  into  a  cotton  mill  and  watch 
the  machines  and  their  less  than  human  attendants  at 
their  over-specialized  tasks.  Then  ask  how  such  work- 
ers can  take  any  joy  in  work?  Let  us  say  they  are  paid 
barely  enough  to  live  upon.  What  food  does  the  desire 
for  achievement  receive?  What  feeds  the  love  of  the 
concrete  finished  product  of  which  a  man  can  proudly 
say,  "  I  did  it !  "     The  restlessness  of  this  thwarted  de- 


THE  METHODS  OF  PURPOSE  269 

sire  is  back  of  much  of  that  social  restlessness  that 
puzzles,  annoys  and  angers  the  better-to-do  of  the  world. 
As  the  factory  system  develops,  as  "  efficiency  "  removes 
more  and  more  of  the  interest  in  the  task,  social  unrest 
will  correspondingly  increase.  One  of  the  great  prob- 
lems of  society  is  this: 

How  are  we  to  maintain  or  increase  production  and 
still  maintain  the  love  of  work?  To  solve  this  problem 
will  take  more  than  the  efficiency  expert  who  works  in 
the  interest  of  production  alone;  it  will  take  the  type 
of  expert  who  seeks  to  increase  human  happiness. 

Native  industry,  the  love  of  work  are  variables  of 
importance.  No  matter  what  social  condition  we  evolve, 
there  will  be  some  who  will  be  "  slackers,"  who  will 
regard  work  as  secondary  to  pleasure,  who  will  take  no 
joy  or  pride  in  the  finished  product,  who  will  feel  no 
loyalty  to  their  organization ;  and  vice  versa,  there  will 
be  those  working  under  the  most  adverse  conditions  who 
will  identify  themselves,  their  wishes  and  purposes  with 
"  the  job  "  and  the  product.  Nowhere  are  the  qualities 
of  persistent  efifort  and  interest  of  such  importance  as 
in  industry,  and  nowhere  so  well  rewarded. 

In  the  habits  of  efficiency  we  have  a  group  of  mechani- 
cally performed  actions  and  stereotyped  reactions  essen- 
tial for  work.  Except  in  certain  high  kinds  of  work, 
which  depend  upon  originality  and  initiative,  method, 
neatness  and  exactness  are  essential.  "  Time  is  money  " 
in  most  of  the  business  of  the  world ;  in  fact  time  is  the 
great  value,  since  in  it  life  operates.  The  unmethodical 
and  untidy  waste  time  as  well  as  offend  the  esthetic 
tastes,  as  well  as  directly  lose  material  and  information. 
The  habits  in  this  sense  are  the  tools  of  industry,  though 
exactness  may  be  defined  as  more  than  a  tool,  since  it 
is  also  part  of  the  final  result.     He  whose  work-con- 


270  THE  FOUNDATIONS  OF  PERSONALITY 

science  permits  him  to  be  inexact,  permits  himself  to 
do  less  than  his  best  and  in  that  respect  cheats  and 
steals. 

The  work-conscience  is  as  variably  developed  as  any 
other  type  of  conscience.  There  are  those  who  are 
rogues  in  all  else  but  not  in  their  work.  They  will  not 
turn  out  a  bad  piece  of  work  for  they  have  identified 
the  best  in  them  with  their  work.  Contrariwise,  there 
are  others  who  are  punctilious  in  all  other  phases  of 
morality  who  are  slackers  of  an  easy  standard  in  their 
work  efforts.  This  is  as  truly  a  double  standard  of 
morals  as  anything  in  the  sex  sphere,  —  and  as  disas- 
trous. 

There  is  on  every  second  wall  in  America  the  motto 
typical  of  our  country,  "  Do  it  now !  "  To  it  could  be 
added  a  much  better  one,  "  Do  it  well !  "  The  energy 
of  work  and  its  promptness  are  only  valuable  when  con- 
trolled by  an  ideal  of  service  and  thoroughness.  A  great 
part  of  the  morals  of  the  world  is  neglected ;  part  of  the 
responsibility  is  not  felt,  in  that  a  code  of  work  is  yet 
to  be  enunciated  in  an  authoritative  way.  I  would  have 
it  shown  graphically  that  all  inefficiency  is  a  social 
damage  with  a  boomerang  effect  on  the  inefficient  and 
careless,  and  in  the  earliest  school,  teaching  the  need 
of  thoroughness  would  be  emphasized.  Our  schools 
are  tending  in  the  other  direction;  the  curriculum  has 
become  so  extensive  that  superficiality  is  encouraged, 
the  thorough  are  penalized,  and  "  to  get  away  with  it " 
is  the  motto  of  most  children  as  a  result. 

In  an  ideal  community  every  man  and  woman  will  be 
evaluated  as  to  intelligence  and  skill,  and  a  place  found 
accordingly.  Since  we  live  a  few  centuries  too  soon  to 
see  that  community,  since  jobs  are  given  out  on  a  sort 


THE  METHODS  OF  PURPOSE  271 

of  catch-as-catch-can  plan,  it  would  be  merely  a  counsel 
of  perfection  to  urge  some  such  method. 

Nevertheless  ambitious  parents,  whose  means  or 
whose  self-sacrifice  enable  them  to  plan  careers  for  their 
children,  should  take  into  solemn  account,  not  their  own 
ambitions,  but  the  ability  of  the  child.  A  man  is  apt 
to  see  in  his  son  his  second  self  and  to  plan  for  him  aa 
for  a  self  that  was  somehow  to  succeed  where  he  failed. 
But  every  tub  in  the  ocean  of  human  life  must  navigate 
on  its  own  bottom,  and  a  father's  wishes  will  not  make 
a  poet  into  a  banker  or  a  fool  into  a  philosopher.  Noth- 
ing is  so  disastrous  to  character  as  to  be  misplaced  in 
work,  and  there  is  as  much  social  inefSciency  in  the 
high-grade  man  in  the  low-grade  place  as  when  the  low- 
grade  man  occupies  a  high-grade  place.  We  have  no 
means  of  discovering  originality,  imagination  or  special 
ability  in  our  present-day  psychological  tests,  and  we 
cannot  measure  intensity  of  purpose,  courage  and  the 
quality  of  interest.  Yet  watching  a  child  through  its 
childhood  and  its  adolescence  ought  to  tell  us  whether 
it  is  brilliant  or  stupid,  whether  it  is  hand-minded  or 
word-minded,  whether  it  is  brave,  loyal,  honest,  a  leader 
or  a  follower,  etc.  Moreover,  the  child's  inclinations 
should  play  a  part  in  the  plans  made.  A  man  who  de- 
velops a  strong  will  where  his  desires  lead  the  way  will 
hang  back  and  be  a  slacker  where  dissatisfaction  is 
aroused. 

To  that  employer  of  labor  who  seeks  more  than  divi- 
dends from  his  "  hands,"  who  has  in  mind  that  he  is 
merely  an  agent  of  the  community,  and  is  not  obsessed 
with  the  idea  that  he  is  "  boss,"  I  make  bold  to  make 
the  following  suggestions: 

Any  plan  of  efficiency  must  be  based  on  sympathy  and 
human  feeling.     To  avoid  unnecessary  fatigue  is  im- 


272  THE  FOUNDATIONS  OF  PERSONALITY 

perative,  not  only  because  it  increases  production,  but 
because  it  increases  happiness.  Fatigue  may  have  its 
origin  in  little  matters,  —  in  a  bad  bench,  in  a  poor  work 
table,  or  an  inferior  tool.  Chronic  fatigue  ^  alters  char- 
acter; the  drudge  and  slave  are  not  really  human,  and 
if  your  workers  become  drudges,  to  that  degree  have 
you  lapsed  from  your  stewardship.  Men  react  to  fatigue 
in  different  ways :  one  is  merely  tired,  weak  and  sleepy 
—  a  "  dope,  "  to  use  ordinary  characterization  —  but 
another  becomes  a  dangerous  rebel,  ready  to  take  fire 
at  any  time. 

More  important  than  physical  fatigue  (or  at  least  as 
important)  is  the  fatigue  of  monotony.  If  your  shop 
is  organized  on  a  highly  mechanical  basis,  then  the 
worker  must  be  allowed  to  interrupt  his  labors  now 
and  then,  must  have  time  for  a  chat,  or  to  change  his 
position  or  even  to  lie  down  or  walk.  Monotony  disin- 
tegrates mind  and  body  —  disintegrates  character  and 
personality  —  brings  about  a  fierce  desire  for  excite- 
ment; and  the  well-known  fact  that  factory  towns  are 
very  immoral  is  no  accident,  but  the  direct  result  of 
monotony  and  opportunity.  It's  bad  enough  that  men 
and  women  have  to  become  parts  of  the  machine  and 
thus  lowered  in  dignity,  worth  and  achievement;  it  is 
adding  cruelty  to  this  to  whitewash  windows,  prohibit 
any  conversation  and  count  every  movement.  Before 
you  may  expect  loyalty  you  must  deserve  it,  and  the 
record  of  the  owners  of  industry  warrants  no  great  loy- 
alty on  the  part  of  their  employees.  Annoying  restric- 
tions are  more  than  injuries;  they  are  insults  to  the 
self-feeling  of  the  worker  and  are  never  forgotten  or 
forgiven. 

*The  Gilbreths  have  written  an  excellent  little  book  on  thig  subject. 
Doctor  Charles  E.  Myers'  recent  publication,  "  Mind  and  Work,"  is 
less  explicit,  but  worth  reading. 


THE  METHODS  OF  PURPOSE  273 

That  a  nation  is  built  on  the  work  of  its  people  — 
their  steadiness,  energy,  originality  and  intelligence,  is 
trite.  That  anything  is  really  gained  by  huge  imports 
and  exports  when  people  live  in  slums  and  have  their 
creative  work  impulses  thwarted  is  not  my  idea  of  value. 
Factories  are  necessary  to  a  large  production  and  a 
large  population,  but  the  idea  of  quantity  seems  some- 
how to  have  exercised  a  baleful  magic  on  the  minds  of 
men.  England  became  "  great "  through  its  mills,  and 
its  working  people  were  starved  and  stunted,  body  and 
soul.  Of  what  avail  are  our  Lawrences  and  Haverhills 
when  we  learn  that  in  the  draft  examinations  the  mill 
towns  showed  far  more  physical  defects,  tuberculosis 
and  poor  nutrition  than  the  non-factory  towns? 

Work  is  the  joy  of  life,  because  through  it  we  fulfill 
purposes  of  achievement  and  usefulness.  Society  must 
have  an  organization  to  fit  the  man  to  his  task  and  his 
task  to  the  man;  it  must  organize  its  rewards  on  an 
ethical  basis  and  must  find  the  way  to  eliminate  unneces- 
sary fatigue  and  monotony.  The  machine  which  in- 
creases production  decreases  the  joy  of  work ;  we  cannot 
help  that,  therefore  society  must  at  least  add  other 
rewards  to  the  labor  that  is  robbed  of  its  finest  recom- 
pense. 

A  counsel  of  perfection !  The  sad  part  is  that  books 
galore  are  written  about  the  ways  of  changing,  but 
meanwhile  the  law  of  competition  and  "  progress  "  adds 
machines  to  the  world,  still  further  enslaving  men  and 
women.  We  cannot  do  without  machines,  —  nor  can  we 
do  without  free  men  and  women.  The  fact  is  that  com- 
petition is  a  spur  to  production  and  to  industrial  mal- 
practice, since  the  generous  employer  must  adopt  the 
tactics  of  his  competitors  whether  in  a  Southern  mill 
town  or  in  Japan. 


274  THE  FOUNDATIONS  OF  PERSONALITY 

I  must  confess  to  a  feeling  of  disgust  when  I  read 
preachments  on  the  joys  of  work,  on  consecrating  one's 
self  to  one's  task.  I  can  do  that,  because  I  do  about 
what  I  please  and  when  I  please,  and  so  do  you.  Mister 
Preacher,  and  so  do  the  exceptional  and  the  able  and 
the  fortunate  here  and  there  and  everywhere.  But  this 
is  mathematically  and  socially  impossible  for  the  great 
majority,  and  unless  a  plan  of  life  fits  that  majority  it 
is  best  to  call  the  plan  what  it  is,  —  an  aristocratic 
creed,  meant  for  the  more  able  and  the  more  fortunate. 


CHAPTER  XIII 

THE  QUALITIES  OF  THE  LEADER  AND  THE  FOLLOWER 

The  social  group,  in  its  descent  from  the  herd,  has 
become  an  intensely  competitive,  highly  cooperative  or- 
ganization. There  are  two  sets  of  qualities  essential 
to  those  phases  of  society  that  concern  us  as  students 
of  character. 

Out  of  the  mass  there  come  the  leaders,  those  who 
direct  and  organize  the  thought  and  action  of  the  group. 
The  leader,  in  no  matter  what  sphere  he  operates,  excels 
in  some  quality:  strength,  courage,  audacity,  wisdom, 
organizing  ability,  eloquence,  —  or  in  pretension  to  that 
quality.  The  leader  is  a  high  variable  and  somehow 
is  endowed  with  more  of  a  desired  or  desirable  char- 
acter than  others.  As  fighter,  thinker  or  preacher  he 
has  made  the  history  of  man.  A  dozen  million  common 
men  did  not  invent  the  wheel;  it  was  one  aboriginal 
genius  who  played  with  power  and  saw  that  the  rolling 
log  might  transport  his  goods.  The  shadow  may  have 
interested  in  a  mild  way  every  contemporary  and  an- 
cestor of  the  one  who  discovered  that  it  moved  regu- 
larly with  the  sun.  And  when  a  group  is  confronted 
by  an  unknown  danger,  it  is  not  the  half-courage  of  the 
crowd  that  adds  up  to  bravery  and  fearless  fighting 
spirit;  it  is  the  one  man  who  responds  to  the  challenge 
with  courage  and  sagacity  who  inspires  the  rest  with  a 
similar  feeling.  The  leaders  of  the  world  stand  on 
each  other's  shoulders,  and  not  on  the  shoulders  of 
the  common  man.     Democracy  does  not  lie  in  an  equal 


276   THE  FOUNDATIONS  OF  PERSONALITY 

estimate  of  men's  abilities  and  worth ;  it  is  in  the  recog- 
nition that  the  true  aristocrat  or  leader  may  arise  any- 
where; that  he  must  be  allowed  to  develop,  no  matter 
who  his  ancestors  and  what  his  sex  or  color  may  be^ 
and  that  he  has  no  privileges  but  those  of  service  and 
leadership. 

The  leadership  qualities  will  always  be  determined 
by  the  character  of  the  group  that  is  to  be  led  and  the 
task  to  be  performed.  Obviously  he  who  is  to  lead  a 
warrior  group  of  small  numbers  in  a  fray  needs  be 
agile,  quick  of  mind,  strong  and  fearless,  whereas  a 
general  who  sits  in  a  chair  at  a  desk  ten  miles  from 
the  fighting  front  and  controls  a  million  men  fighting 
with  airships,  guns  and  bayonets  must  be  a  technical 
engineer  of  executive  ability  and  experience.  The 
leader  whose  task  is  to  exhort  a  group  into  some  plan 
of  action  —  the  politician,  the  popular  speaker  —  needs 
mainly  to  appeal  to  the  sympathies  and  stir  the  emo- 
tions of  his  group ;  his  desire  to  please  must  be  efiflciently 
yoked  with  qualities  that  please  his  group,  and  those 
qualities  will  not  be  the  same  for  a  group  of  East  Side 
immigrants  as  for  a  select  Fifth  Avenue  assemblage. 
In  the  one  instance  an  uncouth,  unrestrained  passion, 
fiercely  emphasized,  and  a  bold  declaration  of  ideals 
of  an  altruistic  type  will  be  necessary;  in  the  second 
all  that  will  be  ridiculous,  but  passion  hinted  at  with 
suave  polished  speech  and  a  careful  outline  of  practical 
plans  are  essential.  The  labor  leader,  the  leader  of  a 
capitalist  group,  will  be  different  in  many  qualities, 
but  they  will  be  alike  in  their  vigor  ^.nd  energy  of  pur- 
pose, in  their  aggressive  fighting  spirit,  their  proneness 
to  anger  at  opposition  but  controlled  when  necessary 
by  tact  and  diplomacy.  They  will  impress  the  group 
they  lead  as  being  sincere,  honest,  able,  knowing  how 


THE  QUALITIES  OF  THE  LEADER        277 

to  plan,  choose  and  fight.  These  last  three  qualities 
are  those  which  the  members  of  the  group  demand ;  the 
leader  must  know  how  to  plan,  choose  and  fight  for 
them.  Nor,  if  he  is  to  succeed  easily,  must  he  be  too 
idealistic;  he  must  not  seek  too  distant  purposes;  the 
group  must  understand  him,  and  though  he  must  keep 
them  in  some  awe  and  fear  of  him,  yet  must  they  feel 
that  he  represents  an  understandable  ideal.  The  leader 
who  preaches  things  out  of  comprehension  arouses  the 
kind  of  opposition  which  finally  crucifies  him. 

The  leader  must  feel  superiority  to  his  group,  and 
whether  he  proclaims  it  or  not,  he  usually  does.  Now 
and  then  he  is  a  cold,  careful  planner,  an  actor  of 
emotions  he  does  not  feel,  a  cynic  playing  on  passions 
and  ideals  he  does  not  share.  Usually  he  is  deeply  emo* 
tional,  sometimes  deeply  intellectual,  but  not  often; 
generally  he  has  his  ears  to  the  ground  and  listens  for 
the  stir  that  tells  the  way  men  wish  to  be  led.  Then  he 
mounts  his  horse,  literally  or  figuratively,  brandishes 
his  sword  and  shouts  his  commands. 

A  leader  springs  up  in  every  group,  under  almost  all 
kinds  of  circumstances.  Let  ten  men  start  out  for  a 
walk,  and  in  ten  minutes  one  of  them,  for  some  reason 
or  another,  is  giving  the  orders,  is  choosing  and  com- 
manding. Often  enough  the  leadership  falls  to  social 
rank  and  standing  rather  than  to  leadership  qualities. 
In  fact,  that  is  the  chief  defect  in  a  society  which  builds 
up  rank  and  social  station ;  leadership  falls  then  to  men 
by  virtue  of  birth,  financial  status  or  some  non-relevant 
distinction.  All  one  has  to  do  is  to  read  of  the  misfit 
leaders  England's  "  best "  turned  out  to  be  in  the  early 
part  of  the  late  war  to  realize  how  inefficient  and  un- 
trustworthy such  leadership  may  be.  One  meaning  of 
democracy  is  that  no  man  is  a  leader  by  virtue  of  any- 


278  THE  FOUNDATIONS  OF  PERSONALITY 

thing  but  his  virtues,  and  that  opportunity  must  be 
given  to  the  real  leader  to  come  into  his  own. 

Leadership  means  neither  selfishness  nor  altruism,  nor 
does  it  connote  wisdom.  A  leader  may  be  rankly  ego- 
istic and  careless  of  the  welfare  of  his  people  —  Alexan- 
der, Napoleon  —  or  he  may  be  imbued  with  a  mission 
which  is  altruistic  but  unwise.  Such,  in  my  opinion, 
was  Peter  the  Hermit  who  started  the  Crusades.  The 
wise  men  of  the  world  lead  only  indirectly,  —  by  a  per- 
meation of  their  thoughts,  slowly,  into  the  thought  of 
the  leaders  of  the  race  and  from  them  downwards. 
Adam  Smith  exerted  a  great  influence.  But  how  many 
read  his  books?  The  leaders  of  thought  did,  and  they 
extended  his  teachings  into  the  community,  but  cer- 
tainly not  as  Adam  Smith  taught.  Christ  made  an  up- 
heaval in  Jerusalem  and  its  vicinity;  a  few  leaders 
taught  revisions  of  His  doctrines,  and  as  the  doctrines 
passed  along,  they  became  institutionalized  and  dogma- 
tized into  a  total,  made  up  as  much  of  paganism  as  of 
Christ's  teachings.  It  is  the  tragedy  of  those  whose 
names  exercise  authority  in  the  world  that  their  teach- 
ings are  often  without  great  influence.  For  all  of 
Christ's  teachings,  the  Christian  nations  plunge  into 
great  wars  and  repudiate  His  doctrines  as  applicable 
neither  to  industry  nor  international  relations. 

If  the  leader  needs  certain  qualities,  the  follower 
needs  others.  He  must  be  capable  of  attachment  to  the 
leader  or  his  institution;  he  must  possess  that  quality 
called  loyalty.  Loyalty  is  the  transference  of  the  ego- 
feeling  to  the  group,  an  institution  or  an  individual. 
It  has  in  it  perhaps  the  self-abasement  principle  of 
McDougall,  but  perhaps  it  is  just  as  well  to  say  that 
admiration,  respect  and  confidence  are  basic  in  it.  Loy- 
alty differs  from  love  only  in  that  there  is  a  sort  of 


THE  QUALITIES  OF  THE  LEADER       279 

inferiority  denoted  in  the  first.  If  you  feel  yourself 
superior  to  the  person  or  institution  claiming  your 
loyalty,  you  are  not  loyal  in  feeling,  though  you  may 
be  in  act;  you  are  bound  by  honor  or  love  and  not  by 
loyalty. 

Loyalty  in  the  inferior  may  be  awakened  by  many 
things,  but  to  be  permanent  the  follower  must  sooner 
or  later  feel  himself  a  part  of  the  program.  He  must 
have  not  only  duties  and  responsibilities  but  benefits, 
and  he  must  be  given  a  visible  symbol  of  membership. 
A  child  becomes  loyal  when  he  is  given  a  badge  or  title, 
and  so  do  men.  This  is  the  meaning  of  uniforms, 
badges,  titles  and  privileges ;  they  are  symbols  of  "  be- 
longing "  and  so  become  symbols  of  loyalty.  From  the 
higher  intellects  loyalty  can  only  be  won  if  they  have 
a  share  in  conference,  in  the  exertion  of  power  and  in 
identification  with  the  institution  in  a  privileged  way. 
Though  cash  and  direct  benefit  do  not  insure  loyalty, 
they  go  a  long  way  toward  getting  it.  Many  a  man 
who  is  a  rebel  as  a  workman  is  loyal  as  a  foreman,  and 
while  here  and  there  is  one  who  is  loyal  and  leal  whether 
the  wind  blows  good  or  ill,  the  histoiy  and  proverbs 
of  men  tell  very  plainly  that  loyalty  usually  disappears 
with  the  downfall  of  the  leader,  or  when  benefits  of  one 
kind  or  another  are  too  long  delayed.  A  man  may  be 
loyal  to  the  leader  or  institution  powerful  and  splendid 
in  his  youth  (usually  pride  is  as  much  involved  as 
loyalty),  but  his  children  never  are. 

Disciplinability  is  a  quality  of  the  follower.  He  must 
be  willing  to  sacrifice  his  freedom  of  action  and  choice 
and  turn  it  over  to  another.  Rules  and  regulations  are 
necessary  for  efficiency.  In  a  larger  sense,  they  become 
laws,  and  the  law-abiding  are  the  disciplined,  ready  to 
obey  whatever  law.     Thus  the  reformers  do  not  come 


280  THE  FOUNDATIONS  OF  PERSONALITY 

from  the  law-abiding  in  spirit;  it  is  the  rebel  who 
changes  laws.  Without  the  law-abiding,  disciplined 
spirit  there  would  be  only  anarchy,  and  though  men 
have  obeyed  frightful  laws  and  still  do,  this  is  better 
than  no  social  discipline.  A  revolution  occurs  when  the 
discipline,  i.e.,  the  rules  and  regulations  and  the  rulers 
and  regulators,  have  not  kept  pace  with  the  new  ideas 
that  have  permeated  society.  Men  are  willing  to  be 
governed;  nay,  they  demand  it,  but  there  must  be  at 
least  a  rude  conformity  between  the  governed  and  the 
laws  by  which  they  are  governed.  In  other  words,  dis- 
cipline of  any  kind  is  welcome  if  the  disciplined  believe 
it  to  be  right  and  just.  Men  accept  punishment  for  in- 
fraction of  a  law  if  they  believe  themselves  to  be  right- . 
fully  punished,  but  rebel  against  unjust  discipline. 

There  are  those  who  deny  either  openly  or  covertly 
the  right  of  society  to  regulate  their  lives  or  desires. 
In  modem  literature  this  type  of  rebel  is  quite  favor- 
ably depicted,  although  he  is  usually  represented  as  fin- 
ally punished  in  one  way  or  another.  Where  a  man  re- 
bels against  a  specific  type  of  restriction  but  favors  an- 
other kind  he  is  a  reformer ;  if  however  he  favors  merely 
the  removal  of  restriction  and  regulation  ^  he  is  an  anar- 
chist and,  in  my  opinion,  without  real  knowledge  of  life. 
While  the  rebel  who  denies  the  right  of  discipline  ex- 
ists, he  is  rare;  the  commonest  rebel  does  not  deny 
society's  right  to  regulate  but  either  will  not  or  cannot 
keep  his  rebel  desires  in  conformity.     Most  criminals 

*  Watch  a  busy  crossing  when  the  trafBc  policeman  is  at  work,  regu- 
lating and  disciplining.  Everything  is  orderly,  smooth-working,  and 
no  one  complains.  Let  him  step  away  for  a  moment;  at  once  there  is 
confusion,  danger  and  the  intensely  competitive  spirit  of  the  drivers 
comes  out,  with  the  skillful  and  reckless  and  selfish  invading  the  rights 
of  the  less  skilled,  timid  and  considerate.  The  policeman's  return  is 
welcomed  by  the  bulk  of  the  drivers.  There  are  very  many  points  of 
similarity  between  society  and  the  busy  crossing  which  need  no  elabo- 
ration on  my  part. 


THE  QUALITIES  OF  THE  LEADER        281 

are  of  this  type,  and  the  inability  to  conform  may  arise 
from  many  defects  in  training  or  original  character. 

In  fact,  though  we  may  rebel  against  discipline  and 
its  various  social  modifications,  most  of  us  are  quite 
anxious  that  others  shall  be  disciplined  and  raise  the 
hue  and  cry  at  once  when  they  rebel.  Behind  this  dis- 
like of  the  rebel  is  certainly  the  feeling  that  he  predi- 
cates a  superiority  for  himself  by  so  doing,  and  this 
injures  our  self-esteem.  Of  course  there  is  and  may 
be  a  genuine  belief  that  he  menaces  society  and  its 
stability,  but  those  who  raise  this  cry  the  loudest  are 
usually  themselves  menaced  either  in  authority  and 
power  or  in  some  more  direct  cashable  value. 

The  qualities  which  are  now  to  be  briefly  discussed 
are  in  the  main  great  inhibitions.  The  moral  code  is  in 
great  part  and  by  the  majority  of  men  understood  as 
inhibition  and  prohibition.  A  man  is  held  to  be  honest 
if  he  does  not  steal  and  truthful  if  he  does  not  lie.  In 
reality  this  conception  is  largely  correct,  and  it  is  as 
we  extend  our  ideas  of  stealing  and  lying  that  we  grow 
in  morality. 

Honesty,  in  relation  to  property,  is  the  control  of  the 
acquisitive  impulses  and  instincts  and  is  wrapped  up 
with  the  idea  of  private  property.  The  acquisitive  im- 
pulses are  very  strong  in  most  people  but  not  neces- 
sarily in  all,  and  we  find  great  variability  here  as 
elsewhere  in  human  character.  One  child  desires 
everything  he  sees,  wants  it  for  his  own  and  does  not 
wish  others  even  to  touch  it,  while  another  gives  away 
everything  he  has.  The  covetous,  the  indifferent,  the 
generous,  the  hoarders,  the  spenders,  —  these  are  a  few 
of  the  types  one  finds  every  day  in  relation  to  the  prop- 
erty and  acquisitive  feelings. 

The  spirit  of  "  mine  "  needs  on  the  whole  little  en- 


282  THE  FOUNDATIONS  OF  PERSONALITY 

couragement,  though  the  ways  to  achieve  "  mine  "  are 
part  of  education.  Mainly  the  spirit  of  "  thine  "  needs 
encouragement,  and  most  of  our  law,  as  differentiated 
from  religion  and  ethics,  has  been  built  up  on  settling 
disputes  in  this  matter.  In  its  primary  form,  honesty 
in  relation  to  property  is  the  willingness  to  conform 
to  society's  rulings  in  this  matter,  e.g.,  the  belief  in 
ownership  as  sacred  and  that  to  acquire  something 
desired  one  must  (ethical  must)  go  through  certain 
recognized  procedures.  The  whole  conception  rests  on 
the  social  instinct's  inhibitions  of  the  acquisitive  in- 
stinct and  in  the  growth  and  strength  of  feelings  of 
conscience  and  duty  as  previously  described.  Social 
heredity  and  tradition  operate  very  powerfully  in  the 
matter  of  this  kind  of  honesty;  to  steal,  as  we  see  it, 
from  neighboring  tribes  is  ethical  for  savage  races,  and 
even  to  steal  such  property  as  women.  Throughout  the 
ages  the  booty  of  war  was  one  of  the  recognized  rights 
of  warriors,  and  even  though  to-day  we  have  conventions 
protecting  the  private  property  of  the  enemy,  this  is 
one  of  those  rules  definitely  understood  as  made  to  be 
broken. 

Stealing  is  very  common  among  children,  who  find 
their  desire  for  good  things  too  strong  to  be  inhibited. 
But  very  quickly  the  average  child  learns  control  in 
so  far  as  certain  types  of  stealing  are  concerned.  Some, 
however,  never  cease  to  steal,  and  in  my  opinion  and 
experience  this  is  true  of  those  who  become  thieves  later 
on.  In  very  few  cases  do  those  who  are  eventually 
pickpockets  and  second-story  men  first  develop  their 
art  in  adolescence  or  youth ;  they  have  stolen  from  earli- 
est childhood.  Those  who  steal  for  the  first  time  in 
adult  life  are  usually  those  exposed  to  great  temptations 
and  occupying  a  position  of  trust,  such  as  the  bank 


THE  QUALITIES  OF  THE  LEADER       283 

officer  or  the  trusted  employee.  Here  the  stress  of 
overexpensive  tastes,  of  some  financial  burden  or  the 
desire  to  get  rich  quick  through  speculation  overcome 
inhibition,  especially  as  it  is  too  often  assumed  by  the 
speculator  that  he  will  be  able  to  return  the  money. 

How  widespread  petty  stealing  is  will  be  attested  to 
by  the  hotel  keeper  and  high-grade  restaurant  owner, 
whose  yearly  losses  of  linen,  silver  and  bric-a-brac  are 
enormous.  The  "  best "  people  do  not  think  it  really 
wrong  to  do  this,  especially  if  the  things  taken  have  a 
souvenir  value.  Farmers  whose  fruit  trees  adjoin  a 
public  thoroughfare  will  also  state  that  the  average 
automobilist  has  quite  a  different  code  of  morals  for 
apples  and  pears  than  for  money  and  gasoline. 

"  Caveat  emptor  "  —  let  the  buyer  beware !  This 
has  been  the  motto  of  the  seller  of  merchandise  since 
the  beginning  of  trade.  It  has  made  for  a  lot  of  cheat- 
ing of  various  kinds,  some  of  which  has  persisted  as 
part  of  the  practice  of  at  least  many  merchants  up  to 
this  day.  Cheating  in  weight  or  quantity  led  to  laws ; 
and  there  cannot  be  any  relaxation  in  these  laws,  or 
false  scales  and  measures  immediately  appear.  Cheat- 
ing in  quality  led  to  adulterations  in  food  stuffs  which 
were  veritably  poisonous,  so  that  it  became  necessary 
for  each  great  nation  to  pass  stringent  laws  to  prevent 
very  respectable  and  very  rich  men  from  poisoning 
their  customers.  Cheating  in  fabrics  still  flourishes 
and  in  unsuspected  quarters,  not  always  those  of  the 
small  dealer.  And,  misrepresentation  flourishted  in 
advertising  openly  and  blatantly  until  very  recently. 
It  is  true  that  advertising  has  changed  its  tastes  and 
uses  dignified  and  high-flown  language,  protesting  the 
abnormally  virtuous  ideal  of  service  of  the  article  ad- 
vertised ;  but  can  it  be  true  that  the  makers  of  every  car 


284  THE  FOUNDATIONS  OF  PERSONALITY 

believe  it  to  be  so  remarkable  in  performance  and  ap- 
pearance? 

To  the  credit  of  American  merchants  let  it  be  stated 
that  a  widespread  improvement  has  taken  place  in  these 
matters,  and  that  on  the  whole  there  never  was  a  more 
unanimous  determination  to  render  service  as  at  pres- 
ent. Yet  while  the  goal  of  business  is  profit,  and  the 
goal  of  the  buyer  is  the  bargain,  so  long  will  there  be 
a  mutual  over-reaching  that  does  not  fall  far  short  of 
dishonesty. 

There  are  types  that  are  scrupulously  honest  in  that 
they  will  not  take  a  penny  of  value  not  obtained  in  the 
orthodox  way  of  buying,  trading  or  earning,  who  will 
take  advantage  of  necessity,  whose  moral  code  does  not 
include  that  fine  sense  of  honor  that  spurns  taking  ad- 
vantage of  adversity.  These  are  the  real  profiteers, 
and  in  the  last  analysis  they  add  to  their  dishonesty 
an  essential  cruelty,  though  often  they  are  pillars  of  the 
church. 

I  have  dwelt  on  the  dishonest;  the  types  of  honest 
men  and  women  who  give  full  value  in  work  and  goods 
to  all  whom  they  deal  with  are  of  course  more  numer- 
ous. The  industrial  world  revolves  around  those  who 
resist  temptation,  who  work  faithfully,  who  give  honest 
measure  and  seek  no  unfair  advantage.  But  that  busi- 
ness is  no  brotherhood  is  an  old  story,  and  poor  human 
nature  finds  itself  forced  by  necessity  and  competition 
into  ways  that  are  devious  and  not  strictly  honest.  It's 
the  system  that  is  at  fault,  for  men  have  formed  a 
scheme  of  creating  and  distributing  values  that  severely 
tries  and  often  weakens  their  ideals. 

Truth  in  the  sense  of  saying  what  is  true  and  truth 
in  the  sense  of  getting  at  ultimate  relations  are  two 
different  matters.     The  first  kind  of  truth  is  the  basis 


THE  QUALITIES  OF  THE  LEADER       285 

of  social  intercourse,  the  second  kind  the  goal  of  philo- 
sophic efforts. 

Speaking  the  truth  invariably  is  not  an  easy  matter 
and  in  the  strictest  sense  is  quite  questionable  as  to 
value.  The  white  lie,  so  called,  the  pleasant,  assumed 
interest,  the  untruth  intended  to  smooth  social  rela- 
tions are  shock  absorbers  and  are  part  of  the  courtesy 
technique. 

In  a  more  technical  sense,  the  untruth  told  to  obtain 
some  advantage  or  to  escape  the  disagreeable  in  one  form 
or  another  is  held  to  be  dishonorable,  but  is  very  widely 
practiced.  People  are  enraged  at  being  deceived  if  the 
deception  is  the  work  of  an  outsider  or  one  not  liked; 
they  are  shocked  if  deceived,  lied  to,  by  one  they  love. 
The  lie  stands  as  the  symbol  of  weakness,  but  to  be 
"  taken  in  "  has  more  than  the  material  hurt  the  lie 
inflicts;  it  wounds  vanity  and  brings  doubt  and  sus- 
picion into  social  relations,  all  of  which  are  very  dis- 
agreeable. It  is  held  by  ethical  teachers  to  be  worse 
to  lie  about  faults  than  to  have  committed  the  faults, 
though  this  may  be  modified  to  mean  only  the  minor 
faults. 

All  judges  and  lawyers  will  testify  that  "  the  truth, 
the  whole  truth  and  nothing  but  the  truth  "  is  very 
seldom  told  in  court.  Controversy  is  the  enemy  of 
truth,  and  when  the  fighting  spirit  is  aroused,  candor 
disappears.  Where  any  gl*eat  interest  is  involved, 
where  the  opponent  is  seeking  to  dispossess  or  to  evade 
payment,  or  where  legal  punishment  may  be  felt,  the 
truth  must  be  forced  from  most  people.  Moreover, 
passion  blinds,  and  the  natural  and  astonishing  inac- 
curacy   in    observation    and    reporting  ^    that    every 

*Not  only  is  this  true  in  law  but  in  all  controversy,  whether  theo- 
logical, scientific,  social  or  personal,  the  ego-feeling  enters  in  its 
narrowest  and  blindest  aspects  to  defeat  honor,  justice  and  truth. 


286  THE  FOUNDATIONS  OF  PERSONALITY 

psychologist  knows  is  multiplied  wherever  great  emo- 
tions are  at  work.  If  perjury  were  really  punished,  the 
business  of  the  courts  would  be  remarkably  increased. 

All  this  is  normal  lying,  —  not  habitual  but  occurring 
under  certain  circumstances.  As  clearly  motivated  is 
the  lying  of  the  braggart,  the  one  who  invents  stories 
that  emphasize  his  exceptional  qualities.  The  braggart 
however  is  a  mere  novice  as  compared  with  the  "  patho- 
logical liar,"  who  does  not  seem  able  to  tell  the  truth, 
who  invents  continually  and  who  will  often  deceive  a 
whole  group  before  he  is  found  out.  The  motive  here 
is  that  curious  type  of  superiority  seeking  which  is  the 
desire  to  be  piteously  interesting,  to  hold  the  center 
of  the  stage  by  virtue  of  adverse  adventures  or  misfor- 
tunes. Hence  the  wild  white-slave  yarns  and  the 
"  orphan  child "  who  has  been  abused.  Every  police 
department  knows  these  girls  and  boys,  as  does  every 
social  service  agency. 

I  am  afraid  we  all  yield  to  the  desire  to  be  interesting 
or  to  make  artistic  our  adventures.  To  tell  of  what 
happens  to  us,  of  what  we  have  seen  or  said  or  done 
exactly  as  it  was,  is  difflcult,  not  only  because  of  faulty 
memory,  but  because  we  like  to  make  the  tale  more  like 
a  story,  because,  let  us  say,  of  the  artist  in  us.  Life  is 
so  incomplete  and  unfinished !  We  so  rarely  retort  as 
we  should  have !  And  a  bald  recital  of  most  events  is 
not  interesting  and  so, —  the  proportions  are  altered, 
humor  is  introduced,  the  conversation  becomes  more 
witty,  especially  our  share,  and  the  adventure  is  made 
a  little  more  thrilling.  And  each  who  tells  of  it  adds 
little  or  much,  and  in  the  end  what  is  told  never  hap- 
pened. "  The  Devil  is  the  father  of  lies,"  runs  the  old 
proverb.  If  so,  we  have  all  given  birth  to  some  of  his 
children. 


THE  QUALITIES  OF  THE  LEADER       287 

Though  direct  lying  is  held  to  be  harmful  and  so- 
cially disastrous,  and  evidence  of  either  fear  and  cow- 
ardice or  malevolence,  the  essential  honesty  of  people 
is  usually  summed  up  in  the  term  sincerity.  The  ad- 
vance of  civilization  is  marked  by  the  appearance  of 
toleration,  the  recognition  that  belief  is  a  private  right, 
especially  as  concerns  religion,  and  that  sincerity  in 
belief  is  more  important  than  the  nature  of  belief. 
What  is  really  implied  by  sincerity  is  the  absence  of 
camouflage  or  disguise,  so  that  it  becomes  possible  to 
know  what  a  man  believes  and  thinks  by  his  words  and 
his  acts.  As  a  matter  of  fact,  that  ideal  is  neither  real- 
ized nor  desirable,  and  it  is  as  wise  and  natural  to  inhibit 
the  expression  of  our  beliefs  and  feelings  as  it  is  to 
inhibit  our  actions.  To  be  frank  with  a  man,  to  tell 
him  sincerely  that  we  believe  he  is  a  scoundrel,  and 
that  we  hate  him  and  to  show  this  feeling  by  act,  would 
be  to  plunge  the  world  into  barbarism.  We  must  dis- 
guise hate,  and  there  are  times  when  we  must  disguise 
love.  Sincerity  is  at  the  best  only  relative;  we  ought 
to  be  sincere  about  love,  religion  and  the  validity  of 
our  purposes,  but  in  the  little  relationships  sincerity 
must  be  replaced  by  caution,  courtesy  and  the  needs  of 
eflftciency.  In  reality  we  ask  for  sincerity  only  in  what 
is  pleasant  to  us;  the  sincere  whose  frankness  and  hon- 
esty offend  w^e  call  boors. 

Sincere  self-revelation,  if  well  done,  is  one  of  the 
most  esteemed  forms  of  literary  production.  Mon- 
taigne's preface  to  his  "  Essays  "  is  a  promise  that  he 
lived  up  to  in  the  sincerity  and  frankness  of  his  self 
and  other  analysis.  "  Pepy's  Diary  "  charms  because 
the  naked  soul  of  an  Englishman  of  the  seventeenth  cen- 
tury is  laid  before  us,  with  its  trivialities,  lusts,  repent- 
ance and  aspirations.     In  the  latter  nineteenth  century, 


288  THE  FOUNDATIONS  OF  PERSONALITY 

Mary  MacLane's  diary  had  an  extraordinary  vogue 
because  of  the  apparent  sincerity  of  the  eager  original 
nature  there  revealed.  We  love  young  children  because 
their  selfishness,  their  curiosity,  their  "  real "  nature, 
is  shown  to  us  in  their  every  word  and  act.  In  their 
presence  we  are  relaxed,  off  our  guard  and  not  forced 
to  that  eternal  hiding  and  studying  that  the  society  of 
our  equals  imposes  on  us. 

We  all  long  for  sincerity,  but  the  too  sincere  are 
treated  much  as  the  skeptic  of  Bjomsen's  tale,  who 
was  killed  by  his  friends.  As  they  stood  around  his 
body,  one  said  to  the  other,  "  There  lies  one  who  kicked 
us  around  like  a  football."  The  dead  man  spoke,  "  Ah, 
yes,  but  I  always  kicked  you  to  the  goal."  The  sincere 
of  purpose  must  always  keep  his  sincerity  from  wound- 
ing too  deeply ;  he  must  always  be  careful  and  include 
his  own  foibles  and  failings  in  his  attack,  and  he  must 
make  his  efforts  witty,  so  that  he  may  have  the  help  of 
laughter.  But  here  the  danger  is  that  he  will  be  listed 
as  a  pleasant  comedian,  and  his  serious  purpose  will 
be  balked  by  his  reputation. 

Sincerity,  thus,  is  relative,  and  the  insincere  are  those 
whose  purposes,  declared  by  themselves  to  be  altruistic, 
are  none  the  less  egoistic,  whose  attachments  and  affec- 
tions, loudly  protested,  are  not  lasting  and  never  in- 
tense, and  whose  manners  do  not  reflect  what  they 
themselves  are  but  what  they  think  will  be  pleasing  and 
acceptable  to  others.  The  relatively  sincere  seek  to 
make  their  outer  behavior  conform,  within  the  possi- 
bilities, to  their  inner  natures;  they  are  polite  but  not 
gushing,  devoted  to  their  friends  at  heart  and  in  deed, 
but  not  too  friendly  to  their  enemies  or  to  those  they 
dislike,  and  they  believe  in  their  own  purposes  as  good. 
The  unhappiest  state  possible  is  when  one  starts  to 


THE  QUALITIES  OF  THE  LEADER        289 

question  the  sincerity  and  validity  of  one's  own  pur- 
poses, from  which  there  results  an  agonizing  paralysis 
of  purpose.  The  sincere  inspire  with  faith  and  coopera- 
tion, if  there  is  a  unity  of  interest,  but  it  must  not  be 
forgotten  that  others  are  inspired  to  hatred  and  rivalry, 
if  the  sincerity  is  along  antagonistic  lines.  We  are  apt 
to  forget  that  sincerity,  like  love,  faith  and  hope,  is 
a  beautiful  word,  but  the  quality  of  sincerity,  like  the 
other  qualities,  may  be  linked  with  misguided  purpose. 
No  one  doubts  the  sincerity  of  the  Moslem  hordes  of  the 
eighth  century  in  desiring  to  redeem  the  world  for 
Mahomet,  but  we  are  quite  as  sincerely  glad  that  sturdy 
Charles  Martel  smashed  them  back  from  Europe.  Their 
very  sincerity  made  them  the  more  dangerous.  In  esti- 
mating any  one's  sincerity,  it  is  indispensable  to  inquire 
with  what  other  qualities  is  this  sincerity  linked,  —  to 
what  nouns  of  activity  is  it  a  qualifying  adjective? 

Honesty,  truthfulness  and  sincerity  are  esteemed  be- 
cause there  is  in  our  social  structure  the  great  need 
that  men  shall  trust  one  another.  The  cynic  and  the 
worldly  wise,  and  also  the  experiences  of  life,  teach 
"  never  trust,  always  be  cautious,  never  confide  in  letter 
or  speech,"  curb  the  trusting  urge  in  our  nature.  The 
betrayal  of  trust  is  the  one  sin;  all  other  crimes  from 
murder  down  may  find  an  excuse  in  passion  or  weak- 
ness, but  when  the  trusting  are  deceived  or  injured,  the 
cement  substance  of  our  social  structure  is  dissolved 
and  the  fabric  of  our  lives  threatened.  To  trust  is  to 
hand  over  one's  destiny  to  another  and  is  a  manifesta- 
tion of  the  mutual  dependence  of  man.  It  is  in  part 
a  judgment  of  character,  it  is  in  part  an  original  trait, 
is  an  absence  of  that  form  of  fear  called  suspicion  and 
on  its  positive  side  is  a  form  of  courage. 

Since  it  is  in  part  a  judgment  of  character  in  the 


290  THE  FOUNDATIONS  OF  PERSONALITY 

most  of  us,  it  tends  to  grow  less  prominent  as  we  grow 
older.  The  young  child  is  either  very  trusting  or  en- 
tirely suspicious,  and  when  his  suspicions  are  overcome 
by  acquaintance  and  simple  bribes,  he  yields  his  for- 
tunes to  any  one.  ( It  is  a  pleasant  fiction  that  children 
and  dogs  know  whom  to  trust,  by  an  intuition.)  But 
as  life  proceeds,  the  most  of  us  find  that  our  judgment 
of  character  is  poor,  and  we  hesitate  to  pin  anything 
momentous  on  it.  Only  where  passion  blinds  us,  as  in 
sex  love,  or  when  our  self-love  and  lust  for  quick  gain  ^ 
or  hate  has  been  aroused  do  we  lose  the  caution  that  is 
the  antithesis  of  trust.  The  expert  in  human  relations 
is  he  who  can  overcome  distrust ;  the  genius  in  human 
relations  is  he  who  inspires  trust. 

For  the  psychopathologist  an  enormous  interest  cen- 
ters in  a  group  of  people  whom  we  may  call  paranoic. 
In  his  mildest  form  the  paranoic  is  that  very  common 
"  misunderstood  "  person  who  distrusts  the  attitude 
and  actions  of  his  neighbors,  who  believes  himself  to  be 
injured  purposely  by  every  unintentional  slight,  or 
rather  who  finds  insult  and  injury  where  others  see 
only  forgetfulness  or  inattention.  Of  an  inordinate 
and  growing  ego,  the  paranoic  of  a  pathological  trend 
develops  the  idea  or  delusion  of  persecution.  From  the 
feeling  that  everything  and  every  one  is  against  h^'m, 
he  builds  up,  when  some  major  purpose  becomes  balked, 
a  specific  belief  that  so  and  so  or  this  or  "  that  group  is 
after  me."  "  They  are  trying  to  injure  or  kill  me  " 
because  they  are  jealous  or  have  some  antagonistic  pur- 
pose. Here  we  find  the  half-baked  inventor,  whose 
"  inventions  "  have  been  turned  down  for  the  very  good 
reason  that  they  are  of  no  value,  and  who  concludes 

*A11  the  great  swindlers  show  how  the  lust  for  gain  plus  the  wiles 
of  the  swindler  overcome  the  caution  and  suspicion  of  the  "  hard- 
headed."     The  Ponzi  case  is  the  latest  contribution  to  the  subject. 


THE  QUALITIES  OF  THE  LEADER       291 

that  some  big  corporations  are  in  league  with  the  Patent 
Office  to  prevent  him  from  competing  with  them;  here 
we  have  the  "  would-be  "  artist  or  singer  or  writer  whose 
efforts  are  not  appreciated,  largely  because  they  are 
foolish,  but  who  believes  that  the  really  successful  (and 
he  often  names  them)  hate  and  fear  him,  or  that  the 
Catholics  are  after  him,  or  perhaps  the  Jews  or  the 
Masons. 

In  its  extreme  form  the  paranoic  is  rare  just  as  is 
the  extremely  trusting  person  of  saintly  type.  But  in 
minor  form  every  group  and  every  institution  has  its 
paranoic,  hostile,  suspicious,  "  touchy,"  quick  to  be- 
lieve something  is  being  put  over  on  him  and  quick  to 
attribute  his  failure  to  others.  In  that  last  is  a  car- 
dinal point  in  the  compass  of  character.  Some  attrib- 
ute their  failure  to  others,  and  some  in  their  self- 
analysis  find  the  root  of  their  difficulties  and  failures  in 
themselves. 

Under  the  feeling  of  injustice  a  paranoid  trend  is 
easily  aroused  in  all  of  us,  and  we  may  misinterpret 
the  whole  world  when  laboring  under  that  feeling,  just 
as  we  may,  if  we  are  correct,  see  the  social  organization 
very  clearly  as  a  result.  Therein  is  the  danger  of  any 
injustice  and  seeming  injustice.  As  a  result  condem- 
nation is  extreme,  wrongly  directed  and  with  little  con- 
structive value.  We  become  paranoid,  see  wrong  where 
there  is  none  and  enemies  in  those  who  are  friendly. 

The  over-trusting,  over-confidential  are  the  virtuous 
in  excess,  and  their  damage  is  usually  localized  to  them- 
selves or  their  families.  They  tell  their  secrets  to  any 
one  who  politely  expresses  an  interest,  they  will  hand 
over  their  fortunes  to  the  flattering  stranger,  to  the 
smooth-tongued.     Sometimes     they     are     merely     un- 


292  THE  FOUNDATIONS  OF  PERSONALITY 

worldly,  absorbed  in  unworldly  projects,  but  more  often 
they  are  merely  trusting  fools. 

Man  the  weak,  struggling  in  a  world  whose  forces 
are  pitiless,  whose  fairest  face  hides  grim  disaster,  has 
sought  to  find  some  one,  some  force,  he  might  unfail- 
ingly trust.  He  raises  his  hands  to  heaven;  he  cries, 
"  There  is  One  I  can  trust.  Though  He  smite  me  I 
shall  have  faith." 


CHAPTER  XIV 

SEX    CHARACTERS    AND    DOMESTICITY 

Originally  reproduction  is  a  part  of  the  function  of 
all  protoplasm ;  and  in  the  primitive  life-forms  an  indi- 
vidual becomes  two  by  the  "  simple  process  "  of  divid- 
ing itself  into  halves.  Had  this  method  continued  into 
the  higher  forms  most  of  the  trouble  as  well  as  most  of 
the  pleasure  of  human  existence  would  never  occur. 
Or  had  the  hermaphrodite  method  of  combining  two 
sexes  in  the  one  individual,  so  frequent  in  the  plant 
world,  found  its  way  into  the  higher  animals,  the  moral 
struggles  of  man  would  have  become  simplified  into 
that  resulting  from  his  struggles  with  similar  creatures. 
Literature  would  not  flourish,  the  drama  would  never 
have  been  heard  of,  dancing  and  singing  would  not 
need  the  attention  of  the  uplifter,  dress  would  be  a 
method  of  keeping  warm,  and  life  would  be  sane  enough 
but  without  the  delicious  joys  of  sex-love. 

Why  are  there  two  sexes?  *  I  must  refer  the  reader 
to  the  specialists  in  this  matter,  but  can  assure  him 
that  no  one  knows.  With  the  rise  of  Mandel's  theory 
of  heredity,  it  has  been  assumed  that  such  a  scheme  of- 
fers a  wider  variety  of  possible  character  combinations. 
At  present  it  is  safe  to  say  that  no  one  can  give  a  valid 
reason  for  the  existence  of  male  and  female,  and  that 
while  this  elaboration  of  the  reproducing  individual 
into  two  parts  may  be  necessary  for  some  purpose,  at 
first  glance  it  appears  like  an  interesting  but  mysteri- 
ous complication. 

*  See  Lloyd  Morgan's  book  on  sex. 


294  THE  FOUNDATIONS  OF  PERSONALITY 

I  refer  the  reader  to  textbooks  in  anatomy  and  em- 
bryology, and  to  the  specialists  on  sex  like  Krafft- 
Ebbing,  Havelock  Ellis  and  Ploss  for  details  as  to  the 
differences  between  man  and  woman.  There  are  first 
the  essential  organs  of  generation,  differing  in  the  two 
sexes,  the  ovary  furnishing  the  egg,  the  testes  furnish- 
ing the  seed  or  sperm ;  then  the  organs  of  sexual  contact ; 
the  secondary  sex  characteristics,  such  as  stature,  dis- 
tribution of  hair,  deposits  of  fat,  shape  of  body  and 
especially  of  the  pelvis,  the  voice,  smoothness  of  skin, 
muscular  development,  etc.  There  is  an  orderly  evolu- 
tion in  the  development  of  sex  characters  which  starts 
with  earliest  embryo  life  and  goes  on  regularly  until 
puberty,  when  there  is  an  extraordinary  development 
of  latent  characters  and  peculiarities.  After  puberty 
maturity  is  reached  by  easy  stages,  and  then  comes  in- 
volution or  the  recession  of  sex  characters.  This  is 
reached  in  woman  rather  suddenly  and  in  man  more 
gradually.  The  completely  differentiated  man  differs 
from  his  completely  differentiated  mate  in  the  texture 
of  his  hair,  skin,  nails ;  in  the  width  and  mobility  of 
pupils,  in  the  color  of  his  sclera,  etc.,  as  well  as  in  the 
more  essential  sex  organs. 

Indeed  there  are  very  essential  bodily  differences 
that  are  obviously  important  though  not  well  under- 
stood. One  is  that  the  bodily  temperature  of  man  is 
slightly  higher  than  that  of  woman,  and  that  he  has 
five  million  red  blood  corpuscles  to  every  cubic  milli- 
meter of  his  blood,  while  she  has  four  and  a  half  mil- 
lion ;  that  his  brain  weighs  considerably  more  but  is  not 
heavier  proportionately;  that  her  bodily  proportions 
resemble  those  of  the  child-form  ^  more  than  do  his, 
which  some  interpret  as  a  point  of  superiority  for  her, 

*■  See  Havelock  EUIb. 


SEX  CHARACTERS  AND  DOMESTICITY     295 

while  others  interpret  it  as  a  sign  of  inferiority.  On 
the  whole,  the  authorities  consider  that  man  is  made 
for  the  discharge  of  energy  at  a  high  rate  for  a  short 
time,  he  is  the  katabolic  element,  while  woman  stores 
up  energy  for  her  children  and  represents  the  anabolic 
element  of  the  race. 

As  a  corollary  to  the  above,  it  is  necessary  to  know 
that  each  human  being  (and  also  each  higher  animal) 
starts  out  with  the  potential  sex  organs  of  both  sexes, 
and  that  each  individual  becomes  sexually  differentiated 
at  about  the  eleventh  week  of  intra-uterine  life.  More- 
over every  male  has  female  organs,  and  every  female 
has  male  organs,  though  in  the  normal  conditions  these 
are  mere  vestiges  and  play  no  part  in  the  sex  life  of 
the  person.  Yet  this  indicates  that  the  separation  of 
male  and  female  is  not  absolute,  and  logically  and  actu- 
ally a  male  may  have  female  characters,  physically  and 
mentally,  and  vice  versa  a  female  may  resemble  the 
male  in  structure  and  character. 

The  sex  relations  have  in  the  racial  sense  reproduction 
as  their  object,  but  it  is  wise  to  remember  that  in  the 
whole  living  world  only  man  knows  this,  and  he  has 
known  it  for  only  a  relatively  short  time.  Furthermore, 
in  youth,  when  the  sexual  life  is  at  its  intensest,  this 
fact,  though  known,  is  not  really  realized,  and  in  the 
individual's  plans  and  desires  parenthood  figures  only 
incidentally,  if  at  all.  Society,  in  its  organization, 
places  its  emphasis  on  child-bearing,  and  so  indirectly 
reproduction  becomes  a  great  social  aim  rather  than  an 
individual  purpose. 

1.  The  feeling  of  parenthood  is,  as  every  one  knows, 
far  stronger  in  woman  than  in  man.  But  here  again 
generalizations  are  of  no  use  to  us,  since  there  are 
women  who  develop  only  a  weak  maternal  feeling,  while 


296  THE  FOUNDATIONS  OF  PERSONALITY 

there  are  men  whose  intensity  of  response  to  children 
is  almost  as  great  as  any  woman's.  Undoubtedly  occu- 
pation in  other  than  the  traditional  woman's  field  is 
weakening  the  maternal  feeling  or  is  at  least  competing 
with  it  in  a  way  that  divides  the  modem  mother's  emo- 
tions and  purposes  and  is  largely  responsible  for  her 
restless  nervousness.  This  I  think  may  safely  be 
stated:  that  industry,  athleticism,  education,  late  mar- 
riage, etc.,  are  not  making  for  better  physical  mother- 
hood.^ On  the  contrary,  the  modern  woman  has  a 
harder  time  in  bearing  her  children,  and  worst  of  all 
she  is  showing  either  a  reluctance  or  an  inability  to 
nurse  them.  Small  families  are  becoming  the  rule,  es- 
pecially among  the  better  to  do.  On  the  other  hand,  the 
history  of  the  home  is  the  gradual  domestication  of  the 
man,  his  greater  devotion  to  the  children  and  to  his 
wife.  The  increase  in  divorce  has  its  roots  in  social 
issues  too  big  to  be  discussed  with  profit  here,  but  per- 
haps the  principal  item  is  the  emancipation  of  woman 
who  is  now  freer  to  decline  unsatisfactory  relations 
with  her  mate. 

2.  The  sex  passion,  as  a  direct  feeling,  is  undoubtedly 
stronger  in  the  male,  as  it  is  biologically  necessary  it 
should  be,  since  upon  him  devolves  the  active  part  in 
the  sex  relationship. ^  The  sexologists  point  out  two 
types  of  sex  feeling,  one  of  which  is  supposed  to  be 
typically  male,  the  other  typically  female. 

The  male  feeling  is  called  sadism,  after  an  infa- 
mous nobleman  who  wrote  on  the  subject.  It  is  a 
delight  in  power,  especially  in  cruelty,  and  shows  itself 
in  a  desire  for  the  subjection  of  the  female.  In  its 
pathological  forms  it  substitutes  cruelty  for  the  sexual 

*"The  Nervous  Housewife." 

*  See  Havelock  Ellis,  Krafft-Ebbing,  Freud. 


SEX  CHARACTERS  AND  DOMESTICITY     297 

relation,  and  we  have  thus  the  horrible  Jack  the  Rip- 
pers, etc.  The  Freudians  go  to  the  extreme  of  seeing 
in  all  love  of  power  a  sadism,  but  the  truth  is  that  the 
sadistic  impulse  is  the  love  of  power,  cruelly  or  roughly 
expressed  in  sex.  The  cave  man  of  the  stories  is  a  sad- 
ist of  a  type,  and  one  generally  approved  of,  at  least  in 
theory.  A  little  of  sadism  is  shown  in  the  delight  in 
pinching  and  biting  so  often  seen;  and  the  expression 
"  I'd  like  to  eat  you  up  "  has  a  playful  sadism  in  it. 

The  opposite  of  sadism  is  masochism.  This  is  a  delight 
in  being  roughly  used,  in  being  the  victim  of  aggression. 
The  typical  female  is  supposed  to  rejoice  in  the  power 
and  strength  of  the  male  as  exerted  on  her.  The  admi- 
ration women  often  give  to  the  uncouthly  strong,  their 
praise  of  virility,  is  masochistic  in  its  origin.  The 
desire  of  the  peasant  woman  to  be  beaten  as  a  mark 
of  man's  love  is  supposed  to  be  masochistic,  a  pleasure 
in  pain,  which  is  held  to  be  a  primitive  female  reaction. 

Sex  psychopathology  discloses  innumerable  cases 
where  extreme  sadism  and  masochism  exist  in  both 
sexes;  that  is,  not  only  males  but  females  are  sadistic, 
and  so  not  only  females  but  males  are  masochistic.  Un- 
doubtedly in  minor  degree  both  qualities  express  them- 
selves in  male  and  female ;  undoubtedly  the  male  is  more 
frequently  a  sadist  than  is  the  female.  Though  the 
majority  of  women  may  thrill  in  the  strength  and  power 
of  the  lover,  there  are  relatively  few  American  women 
who  will  tolerate  real  roughness  or  cruelty.  As  a  mat- 
ter of  fact  the  basic  feelings  in  sex  love,  aside  from  the 
sexual  urge  itself,  are  tenderness  and  admiration. 
Naturally  men  desire  to  protect,  and  this  becomes  part 
of  their  tenderness;  they  admire  and  love  the  beauty 
of  women  and  are  attracted  by  the  essential  (or  sup- 
posed essential)  feminine  qualities.    And  as  naturally 


298  THE  FOUNDATIONS  OF  PEKSONALITY 

women  desire  to  be  protected;  this  enhances  their  ten- 
derness, and  their  admiration  is  elicited  by  the  peculiar 
male  characters  of  strength,  hardihood  and  aggressive- 
ness, as  well  as  by  beauty  and  human  qualities  generally. 
Though  the  love  of  conquest  is  a  part  of  sex  feeling, 
it  is  neither  male  nor  female,  but  is  that  feeling  of 
superiority  and  power  so  longed  for  in  all  relations. 
Men  like  to  conquer  the  proud,  reserved,  haughty  woman 
because  she  piques  them,  and  women  often  set  out  to 
"  win  "  the  reserved  "  woman  hater  "  for  the  same  rea- 
son. Thus  tenderness  and  sex  passion,  with  sadism  and 
masochism  in  lesser  degree,  are  basic  in  sex  feeling,  but 
other  qualities  enter  so  largely  that  any  complete  analy- 
sis is  almost  impossible.  The  belief,  engendered  by 
romance  and  teaching,  that  happiness  lies  in  love,  spurs 
youth  on.  Admiration  for  achievement,  love  of  beauty, 
desire  for  the  social  standing  that  winning  some  one 
gives,  desire  for  home  and  perhaps  even  for  children 
are  some  of  the  factors  of  love. 

Sex  passion  varies  enormously  in  people.  In  some 
men  it  is  an  almost  constant  desire,  obsessive,  and  is 
relatively  uncritical  and  unchoosing.  Occasionally, 
though  much  more  rarely,  the  same  condition  is  found 
in  women.  Such  abnormal  individuals  are  almost  cer- 
tain of  social  disaster,  and  when  married  their  conduct 
usually  leads  to  divorce  or  desertion.  Then  there  is  a 
wide  range  of  types  down  to  the  almost  sexless  persons,^ 
the  frigid,  who  are  much  more  commonly  found  among 
women  than  men.  In  fact,  with  many  women  active 
sex  desire  may  never  occur,  and  for  others  it  is  a  rarity, 
while  still  others  find  themselves  definitely  desirous 

*  Some  claim  that  the  "  frigid "  woman  is  such  because  her  mate  is 
ignorant  of  the  art  of  love.  This  is  true  of  some  frigid  women.  In- 
struction to  men  and  women  about  to  be  married  on  the  technique  of 
sexual  life  might  well  take  a  fine  place  in  the  curriculum  of  life. 


SEX  CHARACTEKS  AND  DOMESTICITY     299 

only  after  pregnancy.  Not  only  are  women  less  pas- 
sionate, but  their  desire  is  more  "finicky,"  more  in 
need  of  appropriate  circumstances,  the  proper  setting 
and  the  chosen  mate  than  with  man.  In  other  words, 
sex  desire  is  more  physical  and  urgent  in  the  man  and 
more  psychical  and  selective  in  the  woman. 

A  curious  by-product  of  the  sexual  feeling  is  fetich- 
ism.  To  do  it  justice,  fetichism  is  found  in  all  feeling 
toward  others,  but  is  most  developed  in  sex  relation. 
The  fetich  is  a  symbol  of  the  desired  person,  thus  the 
handkerchief  and  glove  of  the  woman  or  the  hat  of  the 
man.  Pathologically  any  part  of  the  dress  —  the  shoe 
or  the  undergarments  —  may  become  so  closely  asso- 
ciated with  sexual  feeling  as  to  evoke  it  indiscriminately 
or  even  to  displace  it.  Normal  fetich  formation  may 
become  a  bit  foolish  and  sentimental  but  never  becomes 
a  predominant  factor  in  sex  relationship. 

The  history  of  modesty  is  the  history  of  the  sex 
taboo.  As  pointed  out,  the  sex  feelings  are  the  most 
restricted  of  any  of  the  instincts.  I  despair  of  giving 
an  adequate  summary  of  this,  but  it  may  be  best  stated 
by  declaring  that  all  the  restrictions  we  hold  as  im- 
perative have,  at  one  time  or  another  in  some  place, 
been  regarded  as  sacred  and  desirable.  Brother  and 
sister  marriages  were  favored  by  Egyptian  royalty, 
prostitution  was  a  rite  in  Phoenician  worship,  phallic 
worship  frankly  held  as  a  symbol  that  which  to-day  we 
hold  profane  (in  a  silly  way),  plural  marriage  was  and 
is  countenanced  in  a  large  part  of  the  world  to-day,  mar- 
riage for  love  is  held  as  foolish  in  most  countries,  even 
now.  The  practice  of  child  restriction  now  prevalent 
in  Europe  and  America  would  be  looked  at  with  horror 
in  those  countries  where  children  of  ten  or  eleven  are 
allowed  to  marry.     Exogamy,   endogamy,  monogamy, 


300  THE  FOUNDATIONS  OF  PEESONALITY 

polygamy,  —  all  these  are  customs  and  taboos,  and 
though  in  our  day  and  country  monogamy  has  the  social 
and  religious.sanction,  there  is  nothing  to  indicate  that 
this  is  a  permanent  resting  place  for  marriage.  Cer- 
tainly the  statistics  of  divorce  indicate  a  change  in  the 
permanent  status  of  marriage. 

What  this  is  meant  to  emphasize  is  the  social  nature 
of  sexual  modesty.  Modesty  of  other  kind  rests  either 
on  a  moderate  self-valuation  or  a  desire  to  avoid  offense 
by  not  emphasizing  one's  own  value,  or  it  is  both.  How- 
ever sexual  modesty  originated,  practically  it  consists 
in  the  concealing  of  certain  parts  of  the  body,  avoiding 
certain  topics  of  conversation,  especially  in  the  pres- 
ence of  the  other  sex,  and  behaving  in  such  fashion  as 
to  restrict  sexual  demonstration.  There  is  a  natural 
coyness  in  women  which  has  been  socially  empha- 
sized by  restrictions  in  dress,  conduct  and  speech 
to  a  ridiculous  degree.  Thus  it  was  immodest  in  our 
civilization  for  women  to  show  their  legs,  and  the  leg 
became  the  symbol  of  the  femaleness  of  the  woman 
or  girl,  as  also  did  the  breast.^  The  body  became  taboo, 
and  at  present,  when  women  are  commencing  to  dress 
so  that  the  legs  are  shown,  the  arms  are  bare,  and  the 
back  and  shoulders  visible,  the  cry  of  immodesty,  im- 
morality and  social  demoralization  is  raised,  as  if  real 
moralit;f  rested  in  these  ridiculous,  barbaric  taboos. 

But  no  matter  how  much  one  emphasizes  the  arbi- 
trary nature  of  modesty,  of  the  restrictions  placed  on 
dress,  speech  and  conduct,  it  still  remains  true  that 
their  function  is  at  present  to  act  as  inhibitors.  Ridicu- 
lous as  it  is  to  believe  that  morality  resides  in  the  length 
of  the  skirt  or  in  the  degree  of  paint  and  powder  on  the 

*A11  the  anthropologists,  Tyler,  McLennan,  Ellis  and  especially 
Frazier,  deal  at  length  with  this  fascinating  subject.  The  psycho- 
pathologists  relate  the  most  extraordinary  stories  of  fetich  love. 


SEX  CHARACTERS  AND  DOMESTICITY     301 

face,  the  fact  is  that  usually  they  who  depart  too  widely 
from  the  conventional  in  these  matters  are  uninhibited 
and  are  as  apt  to  depart  from  the  conventional  in  deed 
as  they  are  in  deportment.  There  are  those  who  say 
that  we  would  be  far  more  moral  if  we  went  about 
naked;  that  clothes  suggest  more  than  nakedness  re- 
veals. This  is  true  of  some  kinds  of  clothes  —  the  half 
nakedness  of  the  stage  or  the  ballroom,  or  the  coquettish 
additions  to  clothes  represented  by  the  dangling  tas- 
sels—  but  it  is  not  true  of  the  riding  breeches,  or  the 
trim  sport  clothes,  or  the  walking  suit.  The  dress  of 
men,  though  ugly,  is  useful,  convenient  and  modest, 
and  there  is  no  doubt  that  a  generation  of  free  wo- 
men, determined  to  become  human  in  appearance, 
could  evolve  a  modest  and  yet  decorative  costume.  All 
of  the  present-day  extravagance  in  female  attire,  with  its 
ever-changing  fashion,  is  a  medley  of  commercial  in- 
trigues, female  competition  and  sex  excitement.  Though 
the  modesty  restrictions  are  absurd,  the  motive  that 
obscurely  prompts  it  is  not,  and  the  transgressors  either 
seek  notice  in  a  risky  way,  are  foolish,  to  speak  bluntly, 
or  else  are  inviting  actual  sexual  advances. 

Though  we  may  actually  restrict  the  sex  life  so  that 
some  men  and  women  become  pure  in  the  accepted  sense, 
it  will  always  be  true  that  men  and  women  will  be  vague- 
ly or  definitely  attracted  to  each  other.  Like  the  atmos- 
pheric pressure  which  though  fifteen  pounds  to  the 
square  inch  at  the  sea  level  is  not  felt,  so  there  exists 
a  sex  pressure,  excited  by  men  and  women  in  each 
other.  There  is  a  smoldering  excitement  always  ready 
to  leap  into  flame  whenever  the  young  and  attractive 
of  the  sexes  meet.  The  conventions  of  modesty  tend  to 
restrict  the  excitement,  to  neutralize  the  sex  pressure, 
but  they  may  be  swept  aside  by  immodesty  and  the  sug- 


302  THE  FOUNDATIONS  OF  PERSONALITY 

gestive.  The  explanation  of  the  anger  and  condemna- 
tion felt  by  the  moral  man  in  the  presence  of  the 
"  brazen  "  woman  lies  in  the  threat  to  his  purposes  of 
respectability  and  faithfulness;  he  is  angered  that  this 
creature  can  arouse  a  conflict  in  him.  The  bitterness 
of  the  "  saint  "  against  the  wanton  originates  in  the  ease 
with  which  she  tempts  him,  and  his  natural  conclusion 
is  that  the  fault  lies  with  her  and  not  with  his  own 
passions.  The  respectable  woman  inveighs  against 
her  more  untrammeled  sister,  not  so  much  through  her 
concern  for  morality,  as  through  the  anger  felt  against 
an  unscrupulous  competitor  who  is  breaking  the  rules. 
In  so  far  as  women  are  concerned,  the  sex  pressure  on 
them  is  increased  in  many  ways.  For  two  years  I  ex- 
amined, mentally,  the  girls  who  were  listed  as  sex  of- 
fenders by  the  various  social  agencies  of  Boston.  As 
a  result  of  that  experience,  plus  that  of  a  physician  and 
citizen  of  the  world,  a  few  facts  of  importance  stand 
out  in  my  mind. 

1.  There  is  a  group  of  men  whom  one  may  call  sex 
adventurers.  These  are  not  all  of  one  kind  in  edu- 
cation, social  status  and  age,  but  they  seek  sex 
experiences  wherever  they  go  and  are  always  alert  for 
signs  that  indicate  a  chance  to  become  intimate.  They 
take  advantage  of  the  widespread  tendency  to  flirt  and 
haunt  the  places  where  the  young  girls  tend  to  parade 
up  and  down  (certain  streets  in  every  large  city),  the 
public  dance  halls,  the  skating  resorts,  the  crowded 
public  beaches,  etc.  They  regard  themselves  as  con- 
noisseurs in  women  and  think  they  know  when  a  girl 
is  "  ripe  " ;  they  are  ready  to  spend  money  and  utilize 
flattery,  gifts  and  bold  wooing,  according  to  their  na- 
ture and  the  way  they  size  up  their  prey. 

2.  The  female  sex  adventurer  is  not  so  common,  ex- 


SEX  CHARACTERS  AND  DOMESTICITY     303 

cept  in  the  higher  criminal  classes  where  the  effort  to 
ensnare  rich  men  calls  forth  the  abilities  of  certain 
women.  In  a  limited  way  the  prostitute,  professed  or 
clandestine,  is  a  sex  adventurer,  but  ordinarily  she  is 
merely  supplying  a  demand  and  has  only  to  exert  her- 
self physically,  rarely  needing  to  conquer  men's  inhi- 
bitions. We  omit  here  the  schemes  of  conquest  of 
girls  and  women  seeking  marriage  as  too  complex  for 
any  one  but  a  novelist,  and  also  because  the  moral  code 
regards  them  as  legitimate.  Women  who  are  ready  to 
accept  sexual  advances  are  common  enough  in  the  un- 
inhibited girl,  the  dissatisfied  married  woman,  the 
young  widow,  the  drug  habitue;  but  aside  from  the 
woman  who  has  capitalized  her  sex,  the  sex  adventurer 
is  largely  male. 

What  attracts  him?  For  he  rarely  pesters  the  good 
woman,  and  ordinarily  the  average  woman  is  not  so- 
licited. 

The  girl  usually  "  picked  up  "  dresses  immodestly  or 
in  the  extreme  of  style,  even  though  she  is  essentially 
shabby  and  poorly  clad.  To-day  business  sees  to  it  that 
fripperies  are  within  the  reach  of  every  purse. 

She  usually  corresponds  to  a  type  of  prettiness  fa- 
vored in  the  community,  often  what  is  nowadays  called 
the  chicken  type.  Plump  legs  and  fairly  prominent 
bosom  and  hips  are  symbols  of  those  desired  among  all 
grades  of  men,  together  with  a  pretty  face.  The  homely 
girl  finds  it  much  easier  to  walk  unmolested. 

If  she  appears  intelligent  and  firm,  the  above  qualities 
will  only  entitle  her  to  glances,  respectful  and  other- 
wise. The  sex  adventurer  hates  to  be  rebuffed,  and  he 
is  not  desperately  in  love,  so  that  he  will  not  risk  his 
vanity.     If  she  appears  of  that  pert  vivacious  type  just 


304  THE  FOUNDATIONS  OF  PERSONALITY 

above  the  moron  level  —  in  other  words  if  she  is  neither 
bright  nor  really  feeble-minded  —  then  sex  pressure  is 
increased.  The  feeble-minded  girl  of  the  moron  type, 
or  the  over-innocent  and  unenlightened  girl,  is  always 
in  danger. 

There  is  further  the  sexually  excited  or  the  uninhib- 
ited girl.  We  must  differentiate  between  those  who 
attempt  no  control,  and  those  whose  surge  of  desire  is 
beyond  the  normal  limits.  The  uninhibited  of  both  sexes 
are  a  large  group,  and  the  bulk  of  the  prostitutes  are 
deficient  in  this  respect  rather  than  in  intelligence. 
Sometimes  inhibition  arrives  late,  after  sexual  immo- 
rality has  commenced.  In  men  this  is  common,  but 
unfortunately  for  women,  society  stands  in  their  way 
when  this  occurs  with  them.  "  Youth  must  have  its 
fling  "  is  a  masculine  privilege  denied  to  feminine  of- 
fenders. 

The  desire  for  a  good  time  plays  havoc  with  the  unin- 
hibited girl.  Unable  to  find  interest  in  her  work,  which 
too  often  is  uninteresting,  desiring  good  clothes  and 
excitement,  she  discovers  that  these  are  within  her 
reach  if  she  follows  her  instincts.  What  starts  out  as 
a  flirtation  ends  in  social  disaster,  and  a  girl  finds 
out  that  some  men  who  give  good  times  expect  to  be 
paid  for  them. 

Since  our  study  is  not  a  pathological  treatise,  we 
must  omit  further  consideration  of  the  offender  and 
dismiss  without  more  comment  the  whole  range  of  the 
perverter.  It  suffices  to  say  that  the  perverted  are 
often  such  congenitally,  in  which  case  nothing  can  be 
done  for  them,  and  others  are  the  results  of  certain  en- 
vironments, which  range  all  the  way  from  girls' 
boarding-schools  to  the  palaces  of  kings. 

In  ancient  times,  and  in  many  countries  to-day,  cer- 


SEX  CHARACTERS  AND  DOMESTICITY     305 

tain  perversions  were  so  common  as  to  defy  belief,  and 
we  are  compelled  to  associate  with  some  of  the  greatest 
names,  practices  ^  that  shock  us.  These  same  an- 
cients would  denounce  as  unnatural  in  as  hearty 
terms  the  increasing  practices  of  child-limitation 
among  us. 

The  sex  desires  and  instincts  struggle  with,  over- 
come or  harmonize  with  the  social  instincts.  It  would 
be  impossible  to  portray  even  the  simplest  sex  life  from 
the  mental  standpoint.  The  chastest  woman  who  is 
unconscious  of  sex  desire  is  motivated  by  romance  and 
the  sex  feelings  and  customs  of  others  in  her  ideas  of 
happiness  and  right  behavior.  The  cynical  profligate, 
indulging  every  sensual  urge,  in  so  far  as  he  can,  must 
guide  himself  by  the  resistance  of  society,  by  the  neces- 
sity of  camouflage,  the  fear  of  public  opinion  and  often 
the  impediment  of  his  own  early  training.  Men  and 
women  start  out  perhaps  as  romantic  idealists,  enter 
marriage,  and  in  the  course  of  their  experiences  become 
almost  frankly  sensual.  And  in  the  opposite  direction, 
men  and  women  wildly  passionate  in  youth  develop 
counter  tendencies  that  swing  them  into  restraint  and 
serene  self-control.  There  are  those  to  whom  sex  is 
mere  appetite,  to  be  indulged  and  put  out  of  the  way, 
so  as  not  to  interfere  with  the  great  purposes  of  suc- 
cess; there  are  those  to  whom  it  is  a  religion,  carried 
on  with  ceremonials  and  rites ;  there  are  those  to  whom 
it  is  an  obsession,  and  their  minds  are  in  a  sexual  stew 
at  all  times.  There  are  the  under-inhibited,  spoken  of 
above,  and  there  are  the  over-inhibited.  Puritanical, 
rebelling  at  the  flesh  as  such,  disguising  all  their  emo- 

^I  pass  over  as  out  of  the  range  of  this  book  the  question  raised 
by  Freud,  whether  or  not  we  are  all  of  us  homo-sexual  as  well  as 
heterosexual. 


306  THE  FOUNDATIONS  OF  PERSONALITY 

tions,  reluctant  to  admit  their  humanness  and  the  valid- 
ity of  pleasure. 

The  romantic  ideal,  glorifying  a  sort  of  asexual  love 
of  perfect  men  and  women,  asceticism  which  permits 
sex  only  as  a  sort  of  necessary  evil  and  sensuality  which 
proclaims  the  pleasure  of  sex  as  the  only  joy  and  scoffs 
at  inhibition  influence  the  lives  of  us  all.  The  effect 
of  the  forbidden,  the  tantalizing  curiosity  aroused  and 
the  longing  to  rise  above  the  level  of  lust  make  the  sex 
adjustment  the  most  difficult  of  all  and  produce  the 
queerest  results.  Sex  is  a  road  to  power  and  to  failure, 
a  road  to  health  and  sickness.  As  in  all  adjustments, 
there  are  some  who  are  conscious  of  but  few  difficulties, 
who  are  moral  or  immoral  without  struggle  or  discon- 
tent. Contrasted  with  these  are  the  ones  who  find 
morality  a  great  burden,  and  those  who,  yielding  to  de- 
sire, find  continuous  inner  conflict  and  dissatisfaction 
and  lowered  self-valuation  as  a  result. 

Our  society  is  organized  on  chastity  and  continence 
prior  to  marriage,  purity  and  constancy  after  marriage. 
That  noble  ideal  has  never  been  realized ;  the  stories  of 
Pagan  times,  of  the  Middle  Ages  and  of  the  present  day, 
aa  well  as  everyday  human  experience,  show  that  the 
male  certainly  has  not  lived  up  to  his  part  of  the  bar- 
gain. Legalized  prostitution  in  most  countries,  illegal 
prostitution  in  the  United  States  and  England,  in  ad- 
dition to  the  enormous  amount  of  clandestine  relation- 
ships, are  a  sufficient  commentary  on  the  results.  The 
increasing  divorce  rate,  the  feminist  movement,  the 
legalizing  of  the  "  illegitimate  "  child  in  Norway  and 
Sweden  and  the  almost  certain  arrival  of  similar  laws 
in  all  countries  indicate  a  softer  attitude  toward  sex 
restrictions.  The  rapidly  increasing  age  of  marriage 
means  simply  that  continence  will  be  more  and  more 


SEX  CHARACTERS  AND  DOMESTICITY     307 

difficult,  for  I  am  not  one  of  those  who  believe  that  the 
repression  of  this  vital  instinct  is  without  harm.  Con- 
tinence is  socially  necessary,  but  beyond  a  certain  age  it 
is  physically  and  mentally  harmful.  Man  is  thus  placed 
on  the  horns  of  a  dilemma  from  which  it  will  take  the 
greatest  wisdom  and  the  finest  humanity  to  extricate 
him.  But  I  cannot  lay  claim  to  any  part  of  the  knowl- 
edge and  ability  necessary  to  formulate  the  plan.  Let 
us  at  least  be  candid;  let  us  not  say  grandiloquently 
that  the  sexual  urge  can  be  indefinitely  repressed  with- 
out harm  to  the  average  individual.  We  may  safely 
assert  that  there  are  people,  men  and  women  both,  to 
whom  the  sex  impulses  are  vague  and  of  little  force, 
but  to  the  great  majority,  at  least  of  men,  sex  desire  is 
almost  a  hunger,  and  unsatisfied  it  brings  about  a  rest- 
lessness and  dissatisfaction  that  enters  into  all  the  men- 
tal life.  On  what  basis  society  will  meet  this  situation 
I  do  not  pretend  to  know,  but  this  is  certain,  —  that 
all  over  the  civilized  world  there  is  apparent  an  organ- 
izing rebellion  against  the  social  impediment  to  sexual 
satisfaction. 

For  it  must  be  remembered  that  sexual  satisfaction  is 
not  alone  naked  desire.  It  is  that  —  but  sublimated 
into  finer  things  as  well.  It  is  the  desire  for  stability 
of  affection,  for  a  sympathetic  beloved,  an  outlet  for 
emotion,  a  longing  for  respectable  unitary  status.  The 
unit  of  respectable  human  life  is  the  married  couple; 
the  girl  wants  that  social  recognition,  and  so  does  her 
man.  Both  yearn  to  cast  off  from  their  old  homes  and 
start  a  new  one,  as  an  initial  step  in  successful  living. 
The  thought  of  children  —  a  little  form  in  a  little  bed, 
and  the  man  and  woman  gazing  in  an  ecstasy  of  pride 
and  affection  upon  it  —  makes  all  other  pleasures  seem 


308  THE  FOUNDATIONS  OF  PERSONALITY 

unworthy  and  gives  to  the  ache  for  intimacy  a  high 
moral  sanction. 

This  brings  us  to  the  point  where  we  must  consider 
those  characteristics  that  make  up  domesticity  and 
homekeeping.  Early  impressions  and  the  consistent 
teaching  of  literature,  stage,  press  and  religion  have 
given  to  the  home  a  semi-sacred  character,  which  is  one 
of  the  great  components  of  the  desire  to  marry,  espe- 
cially for  women.  The  home  is,  in  the  minds  of  most 
of  those  who  enter  into  marriage,  a  place  owned,  pecul- 
iarly possessed,  and  it  offers  freedom  from  the  re- 
straints of  society  and  the  inhibitions  of  ceremony  and 
custom.  Both  the  man  and  woman  like  to  think  that 
here  is  the  place  where  their  love  can  find  free  expres- 
sion, where  she  will  care  for  him  and  he  will  provide 
for  her,  and  where  their  children  can  grow  in  beauty, 
intelligence  and  moral  worth  under  their  guidance. 
But  this  is  only  the  sentimental  side  of  their  thought, 
the  part  they  give  freest  expression  to  because  it  is  most 
respectable  and  "  nice."  In  the  background  of  their 
minds  is  the  desire  for  ownership,  the  wish  to  say,  "  This 
is  mine  and  here  I  rule."  Into  that  comes  the  ideal  that 
the  stability  of  society  is  involved  and  the  homekeeper 
is  its  most  important  citizen,  but  when  we  study  the 
real  evolution  of  the  home,  study  the  laws  pertaining 
to  the  family,  we  find  that  the  husband  and  father  had 
a  little  kingdom  with  wife  and  children  as  subjects, 
and  that  only  gradually  has  there  come  from  that 
monarchical  idea  the  more  democratic  conception  cher- 
ished to-day. 

Men  and  women  may  be  considered  as  domestic  or 
non-domestic.  The  domestic  type  of  man  is  ordinarily 
"  steady  "  in  purpose  and  absorbed  more  in  work  than 
in  the  seeking  of  pleasure,  is  either  strongly  inhibited 


SEX  CHARACTERS  AND  DOMESTICITY     309 

sexually  or  else  rather  easily  satisfied;  cherishes  the 
ideal  of  respectability  highly ;  is  conventional  and  habit- 
uated, usually  has  a  strong  property  feeling  and  is  apt 
to  have  a  decided  paternal  feeling.  He  may  of  course  be 
seclusive  and  apt  to  feel  the  constraints  of  contact  with 
others  as  wearying  and  unsatisfactory ;  he  is  not  easily 
bored  or  made  restless.  All  this  is  a  broad  sketch; 
even  the  most  domestic  find  in  the  home  a  certain  amount 
of  tyranny  and  monotony ;  they  yearn  now  and  then  for 
adventure  and  new  romance  and  think  of  the  freedom 
of  their  bachelor  days  with  regret  over  their  passing. 
They  may  decide  that  married  home  life  is  best,  but 
the  choice  is  not  without  dififlculty  and  is  accompanied 
by  an  irrepressible,  though  hidden  dissatisfaction.  On 
the  whole,  however,  the  domestic  man  finds  the  home  a 
haven  of  relief  and  a  source  of  pleasurable  feeling. 

The  non-domestic  man  may  be  of  a  dozen  types.  Per- 
haps he  is  incurably  romantic  and  hates  the  thought  of 
settling  down  and  putting  away  for  good  the  search  for 
the  perfect  woman.  Perhaps  he  is  uninhibited  sexually 
or  over-excitable  in  this  respect,  and  is  therefore  rest- 
less and  unfaithful.  He  may  be  bored  by  monotony, 
a  restless  seeker  of  new  experiences  and  new  work,  pos- 
sessed by  the  devils  of  wanderlust.  He  may  be  an  ego- 
ist incapable  of  the  continuous  self-sacrifice  and  self- 
abnegation  demanded  by  the  home,  —  quarrelsome  and 
selfish.  Sometimes  he  is  wedded  to  an  ideal  of  achieve- 
ment or  work  and  believes  that  he  travels  best  who 
travels  alone.  Often  in  these  days  of  late  marriage 
he  has  waited  until  he  could  "  afford "  to  marry  and 
then  finds  that  his  habits  chain  him  to  single  life.  Or 
he  may  be  an  unconventional  non-believer  in  the  home 
and  marriage,  though  these  are  really  rare.  The 
drinker,  the  roue,  the  wanderer,  the  selfish,  the  non- 


310  THE  FOUNDATIONS  OF  PERSONALITY 

conventional,  the  soarer,  the  restless,  the  inefficient  and 
the  misogynist  all  make  poor  husbands  and  fathers  and 
find  the  home  a  burden  too  crippling  to  be  borne. 

One  of  the  outstanding  figures  of  the  past  is  the 
domestic  woman,  yearning  for  a  home,  assiduously  and 
constantly  devoted  to  it,  her  husband  and  her  numerous 
children.  Fancy  likes  to  linger  on  this  old-fashioned 
housewife,  arising  in  the  early  morning  and  from  that 
time  until  her  bedtime  content  to  bake,  cook,  wash,  dust, 
clean,  sew,  nurse  and  teach ;  imagining  no  other  career 
possible  or  proper  for  her  sex;  leading  a  life  of  self- 
sacrifice,  toil  and  devotion.  Poet,  novelist,  artist,  and 
clergyman  have  immortalized  her,  and  men  for  the  most 
part  cherish  this  type  as  their  mother  and  dream  of 
it  as  the  ideal  wife. 

Perhaps  (and  probably)  this  woman  rebelled  in  her 
heart  against  her  drudgery  and  dreamed  of  better 
things ;  perhaps  she  regretted  the  quickly  passed  youth 
and  dreaded  the  frequent  child-bearing.  Whether  she 
did  or  not,  the  appearance  of  a  strongly  non-domestic 
type  is  part  of  the  history  of  the  latter  nineteenth  cen- 
tury and  the  early  twentieth. 

The  non-domestic  women  are,  like  their  male  proto- 
types, of  many  kinds,  and  it  would  be  idle  to  enumerate 
them.  There  is  the  kind  of  woman  that  "  has  a  career  ", 
using  this  term  neither  sarcastically  nor  flatteringly. 
The  successful  artist  of  whatever  sort  —  painter,  musi- 
cian, actress  —  has  usually  been  quite  spoiled  for  do- 
mesticity by  the  reward  of  money  and  adulation  given 
her.  Nowhere  is  the  lack  of  proportion  of  our  society 
so  well  demonstrated  as  in  the  hysterical  praise  given 
to  this  kind  of  woman,  and  naturally  she  cannot  con- 
sent to  the  subordination  and  seclusion  of  the  home. 
Then  there  is  the  young  business  woman,  efficient,  in- 


SEX  CHARACTERS  AND  DOMESTICITY     311 

dependent,  proud  of  her  place  in  the  bustle  and  stir  of 
trade.  She  is  quite  willing  to  marry  and  often  makes 
an  admirable  mother  and  wife,  but  sometimes  she  finds 
the  menial  character  of  housework,  its  monotony  and 
dependence  too  much  for  her.  The  feminist  aglow  with 
equality  and  imbued  with  too  vivid  a  feeling  of  sex 
antagonism  may  marry  and  bear  children,  but  she  rarely 
becomes  a  fireside  companion  of  the  type  the  average 
man  idealizes.  Then  the  vain,  the  frivolous,  the  sexu- 
ally uncontrolled,  —  these  too  make  poor  choice  for  him 
who  has  set  his  heart  on  a  wife  who  will  cook  his  meals, 
darn  his  stockings  and  care  for  the  children.  To  be 
non-domestic  is  a  privilege  or  a  right  we  cannot  deny 
to  women,  nor  is  there  condemnation  in  the  term,  —  it 
is  merely  a  summary  characterization. 

Though  to  remain  single  is  to  be  freer  than  to  be 
married  and  domestic,  yet  the  race  will  always  have  far 
more  domestic  characters.  These  alone  will  bear  chil- 
dren, and  from  them  the  racial  characters  will  flow 
rather  than  from  the  exceptional  and  deviate  types, 
unless  the  home  disappears  in  the  form  of  some  other 
method  of  raising  children.  After  all,  the  home  is  a 
costly,  inefficient  method  of  family  life  unless  it  has 
advantages  for  childhood.  This  it  decidedly  has,  though 
we  have  bad  homes  aplenty  and  foolish  ones  galore. 
Yet  there  is  for  the  child  a  care,  and  more  important, 
an  immersion  in  love  and  tender  feeling,  possible  in  no 
other  way.  We  should  lose  the  sacred  principles  of 
motherhood  and  fatherhood,  the  only  example  of  con- 
sistent and  unrewarded  love,  if  the  home  disappeared. 
The  only  real  altruism  of  any  continuous  and  wide- 
spread type  is  there  found.  It  is  the  promise  and  the 
possibility  of  our  race  that  we  see  in  the  living  parents. 
We  know  that  unselfishness  exists  when  we  think  of 


312   THE  FOUNDATIONS  OF  PERSONALITY 

them,  and  the  idealist  who  dreams  of  a  world  set  free 
from  greed  and  struggle  merely  enlarges  the  ideal  home. 

But  we  must  be  realistic,  as  well  as  idealistic.  A 
silent  or  noisy  struggle  goes  on  in  the  home  between 
the  old  and  the  new,  between  a  rising  and  a  receding 
generation.  An  orthodox  old  generation  looks  askance 
on  an  heretical  new  generation;  parents  who  believe 
that  to  play  cards  or  go  to  theater  is  the  way  of 
Satan  find  their  children  leaving  home  to  do  these  very 
things.  Everywhere  mothers  wonder  why  daughters 
like  short  skirts,  powder  and  perhaps  rouge,  when  they 
were  brought  up  on  the  corset,  crinoline  and  the  bustle ; 
and  they  rebel  against  the  indictment  passed  out  broad- 
cast by  their  children.  "  You  are  old-fashioned ;  this  is 
the  year  1921."  When  children  grow  up,  their  wills 
clash  with  their  parents',  even  in  the  sweetest  and  most 
loving  of  homes.  Behind  many  a  girl's  anxiety  to  marry 
is  the  desire  for  the  unobstructed  exercise  of  her  will. 
Parents  too  often  seek  in  their  children  a  continuation 
of  their  own  peculiarities,  their  own  characters  and 
ideals,  forgetting  that  the  continuity  of  the  generations 
is  true  only  in  a  biological  sense,  but  in  no  other  way. 
And  children  grown  to  strength,  power  and  intelligence 
think  that  each  person  must  seek  his  experiences  him- 
self and  forget  that  true  wisdom  lies  in  what  is  accepted 
by  all  the  generations. 

Just  as  we  have  the  types  of  husbands  and  the  types 
of  wives,  so  we  judge  men  and  women  by  the  wisdom, 
dignity  and  faithfulness  of  their  parenthood;  so  we 
judge  them  by  the  kind  of  children  they  are  to  their 
parents.  In  this  last  we  have  a  point  in  character  of 
great  importance  and  one  upon  which  the  followers  of 
Freud  have  laid  much  —  over-much  —  stress. 

The  effect  of  too  affectionate  a  home  training,  too  as- 


SEX  CHARACTERS  AND  DOMESTICITY     313 

sertive  parenthood,  is  to  dwarf  the  individuality  of  the 
child  and  make  him  a  sort  of  parasite,  out  of  contact 
with  his  contemporaries,  seclusive  and  odd.  There  is 
a  certain  brand  of  goody-goody  boy,  brought  up  tied 
to  his  mother's  apron  strings,  who  has  lost  the  essential 
capacities  of  mixing  with  varied  types  of  boys  and 
girls,  who  is  sensitive,  shy  and  retiring,  or  who  is  naively 
boorish  and  unschooled  in  tact.  According  to  some  psy- 
chiatrists this  kind  of  training  breeds  the  mental  disease 
known  as  Dementia  Praecox,  but  I  seriously  doubt  it. 
One  often  finds  that  the  goody-goody  boy  of  fifteen  be- 
comes the  college  fullback  at  twenty, —  that  is,  once 
thrown  on  the  world,  the  really  normal  get  back  their 
birthright  of  character.  I  think  it  likely  that  now  and 
then  a  feeling  of  inferiority  is  bred  in  this  way,  a  feeling 
that  may  cling  and  change  the  current  of  a  boy's  life. 
The  real  danger  of  too  close  a  family  life,  in  whatever 
way  it  manifests  itself,  is  that  it  cuts  into  real  social  life, 
narrows  the  field  of  influences  and  sympathies,  breeds  a 
type  of  personality  of  perhaps  good  morals  but  of  poor 
humanity. 

The  home  must  never  lose  its  contact  with  the  world ; 
it  should  never  be  regarded  as  the  real  world  for  which 
a  man  works.  It  is  a  place  to  rest  in,  to  eat  in,  to  work 
in ;  in  it  is  the  spirit  of  family  life,  redolent  of  affection, 
mutual  aid  and  self-sacrifice ;  but  more  than  these,  it  is 
the  nodal  point  of  affections,  concerns  and  activity 
which  radiate  from  it  to  the  rest  of  the  world. 


CHAPTER  XV 

PLAY,  EECREATION,  HUMOR  AND  PLEASURE  SEEKING 

One  of  the  great  difficulties  in  thought  is  that  often 
the  same  word  expresses  quite  different  concepts.  Some 
superficial  resemblance  has  taken  possession  of  the 
mind  and  expressed  itself  in  a  unifying  word,  disre- 
garding the  fundamental  differences. 

Take  the  word  "  play."  The  play  of  childhood  is 
indeed  a  pleasurable  activity  to  the  child,  but  it  is  really 
his  form  of  grappling  with  life,  a  serious  pursuit  of 
knowledge  and  a  form  of  preparation  for  his  adult  ac- 
tivities. It  is  not  a  way  of  relaxation ;  on  the  contrary, 
in  play  he  organizes  his  activities,  shuffles  and  reshuffles 
his  ideas  and  experiences,  looking  for  the  new  combina- 
tions we  call  "  imaginations."  The  kitten  in  its  play 
prepares  to  catch  its  prey  later  on;  and  the  child  dig- 
ging in  a  ditch  and  making  believe  "  this  is  a  house  " 
and  "  this  is  a  river  "  is  a  symbol  of  Man  the  mighty 
changing  the  face  of  Nature.  The  running  and  catch- 
ing games  like  "  Tag  "  and  "  I  spy,"  "  Hide  and  go  seek," 
"  Relievo  "  are  really  war  games,  with  training  in  en- 
durance, agility,  cool-headedness,  cooperation  and 
rivalry  as  their  goals.  Only  as  the  child  grows  older, 
and  there  is  placed  on  him  the  burden  of  school  work, 
does  play  commence  to  change  its  serious  nature  and 
partake  of  the  frivolous  character  of  adult  life. 

For  the  play  of  adult  life  is  an  effort  to  find  pleasure 
and  relaxation  in  the  dropping  of  serious  purposes,  in 
the  "  forgetting  "  of  cares  and  worries,  by  indulging  in 


HUMOR  AND  PLEASURE  SEEKING       315 

excitement  which  has  no  fundamental  purpose.  The 
pleasure  of  play  for  the  adult  is  in  the  release  of  trends 
from  inhibition,  exactly  as  we  may  imagine  that  a  har- 
nessed horse,  pulling  at  a  load  and  with  his  head  held 
back  by  a  check-rein,  might  feel  if  he  were  turned  loose 
in  a  meadow.  This  is  the  kind  of  play  spirit  manifested 
in  going  out  fishing,  dressed  in  old  clothes,  with  men 
who  will  not  care  whatever  is  said  or  done.  There  is 
purpose,  there  is  competition  and  cooperation  and  fel- 
lowship, but  the  organization  is  a  loose  one  and  does 
not  bear  heavily.  So,  too,  with  the  pleasure  of  a  game 
of  ball  for  the  amateur  who  plays  now  and  then.  There 
is  organization,  control  and  competition ;  but  unless  one 
is  a  poor  loser,  there  is  a  relaxed  tension  in  that  the 
purpose  is  not  vital,  and  one  can  shout,  jump  up  and 
down  and  express  himself  in  uninhibited  excitement. 
Whether  this  excitement  has  a  value  in  discharging 
other  excitement  and  feelings  that  are  inhibited  in  the 
daily  work  is  another  matter;  if  it  has  such  a  value, 
play  becomes  of  necessary  importance.  In  outdoor 
games  in  general,  the  feeling  of  physical  fitness,  of  dis- 
charging energy  along  primordial  lines  and  the  happy 
feeling  that  comes  merely  from  color  of  sky  and  grass 
and  the  outdoor  world,  bring  a  relief  from  sadness  that 
comes  with  the  work  and  life  of  the  city  man. 

Often  the  play  is  an  effort  to  seek  excitement  and  thus 
to  forget  cares,  or  it  is  a  seeking  of  excitement  for  its 
own  sake.  Thus  men  gamble,  not  only  for  the  gain 
but  because  such  excitement  as  is  aroused  offers  relief 
from  business  worries  or  home  difficulties.  The  prize 
fights,  the  highly  competitive  professional  sports  of  all 
kinds  are  frequented  and  followed  by  enormous  num- 
bers of  men,  not  only  because  men  greatly  admire  phys- 
ical  prowess,  but  because  the  intense  excitement  is 


316  THE  FOUNDATIONS  OF  PERSONALITY 

sought.  I  know  more  than  one  business  and  profes- 
sional man  who  goes  to  the  "  fights  "  because  only  there 
can  he  get  a  thrill.  There  is  a  generalized  mild  an- 
hedonia  in  the  community,  which  has  its  origin  in  the 
fatigue  of  overintense  purposes,  failure  to  realize  ideals 
and  the  difficulties  of  choice.  People  who  suffer  in  this 
way  often  seek  the  sedentary  satisfaction  of  watching 
competitive  professional  games. 

Indeed,  the  hold  of  competition  on  man  exists  not 
alone  in  his  rivalry  feeling  toward  others ;  it  is  evidenced 
also  in  the  excitement  he  immediately  feels  in  the  pres- 
ence of  competitive  struggle,  even  though  he  himself  has 
little  or  no  personal  stake.  Man  is  a  partisan  creature 
and  loves  to  take  sides.  This  is  remarkably  demon- 
strated by  children,  and  is  almost  as  well  shown  in  the 
play  of  adults.  A  recent  international  prize  fight  awak- 
ened more  intense  interest  than  almost  any  international 
event  of  whatever  real  importance.  That  same  day  it 
passed  practically  unnoticed  that  America  ended  a  state 
of  war  with  Germany. 

A  law  of  excitement,  that  it  lies  in  part  in  a  personal 
hazard  accounts  for  the  growth  of  betting  at  games.  The 
effort  to  gain  adds  to  the  interest,  i.  e.,  excitement.  That 
it  adds  tension  as  well  and  may  result  in  fatigue  and  fur- 
ther boredom  is  not  reckoned  with  by  the  bettor  or 
gambler.  To  follow  the  middle  of  the  road  in  anything 
is  dififtcult,  and  nowhere  is  it  more  beset  with  danger 
than  in  the  seeking  of  excitement. 

Games  of  skill  of  all  kinds,  whether  out  of  doors  or 
within ;  baseball,  cricket,  billiards,  and  pool  afford,  then, 
the  pleasure  of  exertion  and  competition  in  an  exciting 
way  and  yet  one  removed  from  too  great  a  stake.  Defeat 
is  not  bitter,  though  victory  is  sweet ;  a  good  game  is  de- 
sired, and  an  easy  opponent  is  not  welcomed.    The 


HUMOR  AND  PLEASURE  SEEKING       317 

spirit  of  this  kind  of  play  has  been  of  great  value  to 
society,  for  it  has  brought  the  feeling  of  fair  play  and 
sportsmanship  to  the  world.  Primitive  in  its  origin, 
to  take  defeat  nobly  and  victory  with  becoming  modesty 
is  the  civilizing  influence  of  sportsmanship.  In  the  past 
women  have  lacked  good-fellowship  and  sportsmanship 
largely  because  they  played  no  competitive-cooperative 
games. 

I  shall  not  attempt  to  take  up  in  any  detail  all  the 
forms  of  pleasure-excitement  seeking.  Dancing,  music, 
the  theater  and  the  movies  offer  outlets  both  for 
the  artistic  impulses  and  the  seeking  of  excitement. 
In  the  theater  and  the  movies  one  seeks  also  the  interest 
we  take  in  the  lives  of  others,  the  awakening  of  emo- 
tions and  the  happy  ending.  Only  a  few  people  will 
ever  care  for  the  artistic  wholesale  calamity  of  a  play 
like  "  Hamlet,"  and  even  they  only  once  in  a  while. 

Men  and  women  seek  variety,  they  seek  excitement  in 
any  and  all  directions,  they  want  relief  from  the  tyranny 
of  purpose  and  of  care.  But  also,  —  they  hate  a  vac- 
uum, they  can  usually  bear  themselves  and  their 
thoughts  for  only  a  little  while,  because  their  thoughts 
are  often  basicly  melancholy  and  full  of  dissatisfaction. 
So  they  seek  escape  from  themselves;  they  try  to  kill 
time;  reading,  playing  and  going  to  entertainments. 
In  fact,  most  of  our  reading  is  actuated  by  the  play 
spirit,  and  is  an  effort  to  obtain  excitement  through  the 
lives  of  others. 

Humor  ^  is  a  form  of  pleasure  seeking  and  giving, 
but  depends  on  a  certain  technique,  the  object  of 
which  is  to  elicit  the  laugh  or  its  equivalent.  The  laugh 
is  a  discharge  of  tension,  and  while  usually  it  accom- 

*I  use  this  term  to  include  wit,  satire  and  even  certain  phases  of 
the  comic. 


318  THE  FOUNDATIONS  OF  PERSONALITY 

panies  pleasure,  it  may  indicate  the  tension  of  embar- 
rassment or  even  complex  emotional  states.  But  the 
laugh  or  smile  of  humor  has  to  be  elicited  in  certain 
ways,  chief  of  which  are  to  bring  about  a  feeling  of  ex- 
pectation, and  by  some  novel  arrangement  of  words, 
to  send  the  mind  on  a  voyage  of  discovery  which  sud- 
denly ends  with  a  burst  of  pleasure  when  the  "  point  " 
is  seen.  The  pleasure  felt  in  humor  arises  from  the  feel- 
ing of  novelty,  the  pleasure  of  discovering  a  hidden 
meaning  and  the  pleasure  in  the  "  point "  or  motive  of 
the  story,  joke  or  conduct. 

Usually,  the  humorous  pleasure  has  these  motives :  it 
points  at  the  folly  and  absurdity  of  other  people's  con- 
duct, thought,  logic  and  customs.  It  gives  a  feeling  of 
superiority,  and  that  is  why  all  races  love  to  poke  fun 
at  other  races :  certain  characteristics  of  Jew,  Irishman, 
Yankee,  Scot,  etc.,  are  presented  in  novel  and  strik- 
ing fashion,  in  a  playful  manner. 

It  points  out  the  weak  and  absurd  side  of  people  and 
institutions  with  which  we  have  trouble ;  and  this  brings 
in  marriage,  business,  mothers-in-law,  creditors,  debtors, 
as  those  whose  weakness  is  exposed  by  the  tech- 
nique of  humor. 

Humor  likes  to  explode  pretension,  pedantry,  dignity, 
pomposity ;  we  get  a  feeling  of  joy  whenever  those  who 
are  superior  come  a  cropper,  which  is  increased  when 
we  feel  that  they  have  no  right  to  their  places.  So  the 
humorous  technique  deals  with  the  get-rich-quick  folk, 
the  foolish  nobleman,  the  politician,  the  priest  (espe- 
cially in  the  Middle  Ages),  etc. 

Not  only  does  humor  seek  to  obtain  pleasure  from 
an  attack  on  others  and  thus  to  feel  superior  or  to  com- 
pensate for  inferiority,  but  also  it  reaches  its  highest 
form  in  exposing  man  himself,  including  the  humorist. 


HUMOR  AND  PLEASURE  SEEKING       319 

The  humorist,  seeking  his  own  weaknesses  and  contra- 
dictions, his  falsities,  strips  the  disguise  from  himself 
in  some  surprising  way.  Bergson  points  out  that  to 
strip  away  a  disguise  is  naturely  humorous  unless  it 
reveals  too  rudely  the  horrible.  The  humorist  takes 
off  the  mask  from  himself  and  others,  and  in  so  far  as 
we  can  detach  ourselves  from  pride  and  vanity,  we 
laugh.  The  one  who  cannot  thus  detach  himself  is 
"  hurt "  by  humor ;  the  one  who  somehow  has  become 
a  spectator  of  his  own  strivings  can  laugh  at  himself. 
Thus  humor,  in  addition  to  becoming  a  compensation 
and  a  form  of  entertainment,  is  a  form  of  self-revelation 
and  self-understanding  carried  on  by  a  peculiar  tech- 
nique. On  the  whole  this  technique  depends  upon  a 
hiding  of  the  real  meaning  of  the  story  or  situation 
under  a  disguise  of  the  commonplace.  The  humor- 
ist phrases  his  words  or  develops  his  situation  so  as  to 
send  the  thoughts  of  the  listener  flying  in  several  direc- 
tions. There  is  a  brief  confusion,  an  incongruity  is 
felt,  then  suddenly  from  under  a  disguise  the  point 
becomes  clear  and  the  laugh  is  in  part  one  of  triumph, 
in  part  one  of  pleased  surprise. 
'  I  shall  not  attempt  an  analysis  of  the  psychology  of 
humor,  for  illustrious  writers  and  thinkers  have  stubbed 
their  intellectual  toes  on  this  rock  for  centuries.  In 
later  years  the  analyses  of  Freud  and  Bergson  are 
noted,  but  there  is  a  list  of  writers  from  Aristotle  down 
whose  remarks  and  observations  have  brought  out  clearly 
certain  trends.  For  us  the  direction  that  any  one's 
humor  takes  is  a  very  important  phase  in  the  study  of 
character. 

Humor  is  a  weapon,  and  the  humorist  has  two  ends  in 
view:  the  one  to  please  his  audience  and  to  align 
them  on  his  side,  the  second  to  attack  either  playfully 


320  THE  FOUNDATIONS  OF  PERSONALITY 

or  seriously  some  person  or  institution  with  the  tech- 
nique of  humor.  Certain  trends  are  seen  in  humor, 
one  to  seek  a  feeling  of  superiority  by  revealing  the 
inferiority  of  others  in  a  surprising  way,  another  to  re- 
lease a  burdensome  ^  inhibition,  a  third  to  play  with 
and  in  a  sense  mock  the  disagreeable  features  of  life, 
and  the  fourth  to  seek  detachment  from  one's  self, 
to  seek  relief  from  sorrow,  disappointment  and  depriva- 
tion by  viewing  the  self  as  from  afar. 

So  there  is  a  sarcastic  humor  which  points  out  the 
foibles  and  weaknesses  of  others  either  grossly  or  deli- 
cately. Usually  these  others  are  those  differing  from 
one's  own  group  —  the  Irish,  Jew,  farmer,  Negro  — 
and  the  jokes  either  deal  with  their  personal  appear- 
ance (a  low  humor)  or  their  characteristic  expres- 
sions, points  of  view  and  actions.  The  audience  is  con- 
vulsed at  their  quaintness  or  folly,  though  often  enough 
on  the  stage  the  comic  figure  delivers  a  sort  of  wisdom 
mingled  with  his  foolishness,  and  this  adds  to  the  hu- 
morous explosion.  The  sarcastic  humor  in  its  highest 
form  reaches  satire,  where  under  a  disguise  powerful 
institutions  or  the  habit  and  ways  of  life  of  a  group 
are  criticized.  In  polite  society  people  are  continually 
attacking  each  other  in  a  kind  of  warfare  called  repar- 
tee, in  which  the  tension  is  kept  just  without  the  bounds 
of  real  hostility,  while  the  audience  sides  with  the  one 
whose  shaft  is  the  most  telling.  In  the  lower  ranks  this 
interchange,  which  is  surprisingly  frequent,  is  coarse 
and  insulting.  It  is  supposed  to  be  a  test  of  character 
to  be  able  to  "  stand  "  these  attacks  with  equanimity 
and  even  to  join  in  the  laugh  against  oneself.  To  "  kid '' 
and  take  "  kidding  "  is  thus  an  important  social  trait. 

'  In  this  way  humor  is  an  effort  for  freedom ;  through  humor  one 
tastes  of  experiences  otherwise  forbidden. 


HUMOR  AND  PLEASURE  SEEKING       321 

Humor  is  often  used  to  expose  the  folly  of  the  pre- 
tentious. Much  of  the  stock  in  trade  of  the  humorist 
lies  in  his  attack  on  the  pedant,  the  pompous,  the  great, 
the  new-rich,  the  over-important  of  one  kind  or  another. 
To  find  them  less  than  they  pretend  to  be  gives  two  es- 
pecial kinds  of  pleasure  to  the  audience;  the  first  the 
stripping  away  of  disguise  (Bergson),  and  the  second 
the  relief  of  our  own  feeling  of  inferiority  in  their  pres- 
ence by  showing  how  inferior  they  really  are. 

Since  inhibition  wears  on  us,  the  great  inhibitions  are 
directly  attacked  by  the  humorist.  Thus  sex  forms  one 
of  the  great  subjects  of  humor,  and  from  the  obscene 
story  told  by  those  on  whom  the  sex  inhibitions  rest 
lightly  to  the  joke  about  clothes,  etc.,  told  by  those  who 
mock  the  opposite  sex,  the  whole  idea  is  to  bring  about 
pleasure  in  the  release  of  inhibition  and  the  play  of  the 
mind  around  the  forbidden.  Freud  has  some  interest- 
ing remarks  on  this  type  of  humor,  which  he  regards 
largely  as  sexual  aggression.  It  is  necessary  to  say 
that  the  release  of  inhibition  is  always  that  of  an  inhi- 
bition not  too  strongly  felt  or  accepted.  A  really  mod- 
est person,  one  to  whom  the  sex  code  is  a  sacred  thing, 
does  not  find  pleasure  in  a  crude  sex  joke.  Similarly 
with  the  inhibition  surrounding  marriage,  which  is  a 
stock  subject  of  humor.  The  overearnest  person  dis- 
likes this  type  of  humor  and  reacts  against  it  by  calling 
it  "  in  bad  taste."  In  the  Middle  Ages  (and  to-day 
among  those  opposed  to  the  Catholic  church),  the  priest 
and  nun  were  slyly  or  coarsely  attacked  by  the  humor- 
ist, and  in  all  times  those  somewhat  skeptical  find  in 
religion,  its  ceremonials  and  customs,  a  field  for  joke  and 
satire. 

The  most  interesting  of  the  types  of  humor  flirts  with 
the  disagreeable.     Man  is  the  only  animal  foreseeing 


322  THE  FOUNDATIONS  OF  PERSONALITY 

death  and  disaster,  and  he  not  only  quakes  in  the  knowl- 
edge of  misfortune,  but  also  he  jokes  about  it.  It  may- 
be that  the  excitement  of  approaching  in  spirit  the  dis- 
agreeable is  pleasant,  and  perhaps  there  is  pleasure  in 
attacking  disaster,  even  in  a  playful  way.  The  ability 
to  joke  about  other  people's  misfortunes  is  not,  of  course, 
a  measure  of  gallantry  or  courage  and  usually  indicates 
a  feeling  of  superiority  such  as  we  all  tend  to  feel  in 
the  presence  of  the  unfortunate,  even  where  no  element 
of  weakness  has  caused  their  mishap.  But  to  joke  about 
one's  own  troubles,  danger  and  disaster  at  least  indicate 
a  sense  of  proportion,  an  ability  to  stand  aloof  from 
oneself. 

This  propensity  is  remarkably  manifest  in  hospitals, 
in  war  and  wherever  disaster  or  danger  is  present.  The 
soldiers  nickname  in  a  familiar  way  all  their  troubles 
and  all  their  dangers.  The  popular  phrases  for  dying 
illustrate  this,  —  croaked,  flew  up  the  spout,  turned  up 
the  toes,  etc.  In  the  war  the  different  kinds  of  guns 
and  missiles  had  nicknames,  and  puns  were  made  on 
the  various  dreaded  results  of  injury.  It  was  declared 
by  the  soldiers  that  no  missile  could  injure  any  man 
unless  it  has  his  name  and  address  on  it,  which  is,  of 
course,  a  poetical,  humorous  comparison  of  the  missile 
to  a  longed-for  letter.  I  heard  a  wounded  man  say  the 
only  trouble  was  that  the  postoffice  department  mis- 
took him  for  another  fellow.  Grim  humor  always  is 
evident  in  grim  situations;  it  is  a  way  of  evasion  and 
escape,  and  also  it  is  a  challenge. 

When  one  objectifies  himself  so  that  he  sees  himself, 
his  purposes  and  his  weaknesses  in  the  light  in  which 
others  might  see  him  and  find  him  "  funny,"  then  he  has 
reached  the  heights  in  humor.  Certain  people  are  no- 
toriously lacking  in  this  quality  of  detachment,  and 


HUMOR  AND  PLEASURE  SEEKING       323 

they  cannot  laugh  at  themselves  or  find  any  humor  in 
a  situation  that  annoys,  mortifies  or  hurts  them.  Others 
have  it  to  a  remarkable  degree,  and  if  they  possess  at 
the  same  time  the  art  of  telling  the  humorous  story 
about  themselves,  they  become  very  popular.  This  pop- 
ularity accounts  for  a  good  deal  of  seeming  modesty  and 
humorous  self-depiction ;  it  is  a  sort  of  recompense  for 
the  self-confessed  foible  and  weakness;  it  is  a  way  of 
seeking  the  good  opinion  and  applause  of  others  and  is 
sometimes  sought  to  a  ridiculous  extreme. 

The  character  and  the  state  of  culture  stand  revealed 
in  the  type  of  humor  enjoyed.  If  a  man  laughs  heartily 
at  sex  jokes,  one  may  at  least  say,  that  while  he 
may  live  up  to  the  conventions  in  this  matter,  it  is  cer- 
tain that  he  regards  the  inhibitions  as  conventions,  even 
though  he  give  them  lip-homage.  No  one  finds  much 
humor  in  the  things  he  holds  as  really  sacred,  and  if 
these  are  attacked  in  the  joke  he  may  laugh,  but  he  is 
offended  and  angry  at  heart.  Any  man  permits  a  joke 
on  women  in  general,  but  he  will  not  permit  an  obscene 
joke  about  his  wife  or  his  mother.  Humor  must  not 
arouse  the  anger  of  the  audience  or  the  reader,  and  in 
this  it  resembles  wrestling  matches  and  friendly  boxing, 
which  are  pleasant  as  attacks  not  seriously  intended, 
but  the  blows  must  not  exceed  a  certain  play  limit  or 
war  is  declared. 

To  be  entertained,  to  entertain,  to  escape  from  fa- 
tigue, monotony,  inhibition,  to  seek  excitement,  to  while 
away  the  time  and  thus  to  escape  from  failure,  regret 
and  sorrow  are  parts  of  the  life  and  character  of  all. 
They  who  have  nothing  else  but  these  activities  in 
their  lives  are  to  be  pitied,  and  they  are  unwise  who 
allow  themselves  too  little  amusement  and  recreation. 

But  we  have  not  spoken  of  pleasure  as  a  whole,  pleas- 


324  THE  FOUNDATIONS  OF  PERSONALITY 

ure  apart  from  entertainment,  play  and  humor.  The 
satisfaction  of  any  physical  desire  is  pleasant,  so  that 
to  eat  and  drink  and  have  sexual  relations  become  great 
pleasure  trends.  There  are  some  who  live  only  for 
these  pleasures,  ranging  from  glutton  to  epicure,  from 
the  brutally  passionate  to  the  sexual  connoisseur. 
Others  whose  appetites  are  hearty  subordinate  them  to 
the  main  business  of  their  lives,  achievement  in  some 
form.  There  is  a  whole  range  of  taste  in  pleasures  of 
this  kind  that  I  do  not  even  attempt  to  analyze  at  this 
point,  even  if  it  were  possible  for  me  to  analyze  it. 

Pleasure  in  dress,  in  ceremonials,  in  all  the  ornamen- 
tation of  life,  forms  part  of  the  artistic  impulses.  The 
love  of  music  is  too  lofty  to  be  classed  with  the  other 
pleasures.  This  is  true  of  only  a  few  people.  For  most 
of  us  music  is  an  entertainment  and  is  usually  poorly 
endured  if  it  constitutes  the  total  entertainment.  As 
part  of  the  theater,  of  the  movie,  of  dancing,  it  is  "appre- 
ciated "  by  everybody.  To  most  it  stirs  the  emotions  so 
deeply  that  its  pleasure  vanishes  in  fatigue  if  too  long 
endured.  The  capacity  to  enjoy  music,  especially  the 
capacity  to  express  it,  is  one  of  the  great  variables  of  life. 
It  is  true  that  the  poseurs  in  music  and  the  arts  general- 
ly seek  superiority  by  pretending  to  a  knowledge,  inter- 
est and  pleasure  they  do  not  really  have,  just  as  there  are 
some  who  really  try  to  enjoy  what  they  feel  they  should 
enjoy.  Nowhere  is  there  quite  so  much  pretense  and 
humbug  as  in  the  field  of  the  artistic  tastes.  Nowhere 
is  the  arbitrariness  of  taste  so  evident,  and  nowhere  is 
the  "  expert "  so  likely  to  be  a  pretender.  I  say  this 
in  full  recognition  of  the  fact  that  science  and  religion 
have  their  modes  and  pretenses  as  well  as  art. 

The  "  progress  "  of  man  is  marked  as  much  as  any- 
thing by  a  change  in  "  taste,"  change  in  what  is  consid- 


HUMOR  AND  PLEASURE  SEEKING       325 

ered  mannerly,  beautiful  and  pleasant.  This  progress 
is  called  refinement,  although  this  term  is  also  used  in 
relation  to  ethics.  Refinement  in  cooking  leads  to  the 
art  of  the  chef.  Refinement  in  dress  becomes  developed 
into  an  intricate,  ever-changing  relation  of  clothes  and 
age,  sex,  time  of  day,  situation,  etc.,  so  that  it  is  unre- 
fined to  wear  clothes  of  certain  texture  and  hues  and 
refined  to  wear  others.  Refinement  in  manner  regulates 
the  tone  of  voice,  the  violence  of  gesticulation,  the  exhi- 
bition of  emotions  and  the  type  of  subjects  discussed, 
as  well  as  controlling  a  dozen  and  one  other  matters, 
from  the  way  one  enters  a  room  to  the  way  one  leaves 
it.  The  savage  is  unrefined,  say  we,  though  he  has  his 
own  standards  of  refinement.  An  American  is  a  boor 
if  he  tucks  his  napkin  in  at  the  neck  and  uses  bread  to 
sop  up  the  gravy  on  his  plate,  whereas  Italians  find  it 
perfectly  proper  to  do  these  things  and  find  the  bustle 
of  the  American  life  totally  unrefined. 

That  refinement  and  developed  taste  are  matters  of 
convention  and  entirely  relative  is  not  a  new  thesis ;  it  is 
an  old  accepted  truth.  What  I  wish  to  point  out  is  this, 
that  every  development  in  refinement  adds  some  new 
pleasure  to  the  world  but  subtracts  some  old  ones.  He 
who  develops  his  musical  tastes  from  ragtime  to  the 
classics  finds  joys  he  knew  not  of,  but  is  offended  and 
disgusted  whenever  he  visits  friends,  attends  a  movie 
or  a  theater.  When  people  ate  with  their  fingers  there 
was  little  to  be  disgusted  at  in  eating ;  when  people  need 
spotless  linen  and  eight  or  ten  forks,  knives,  and 
spoons  for  a  meal,  a  single  disarrangement,  a  spot  on 
the  linen,  is  intolerable.  The  higher  one  builds  one's 
needs  and  tastes,  the  more  opportunities  for  disgust,  dis- 
appointment and  discontent. 

Most  of  the  people  of  the  world  have  never  under- 


326  THE  FOUNDATIONS  OF  PERSONALITY 

stood  this.  To  the  majority,  acquisition,  the  multiplica- 
tion of  needs,  desires  and  tastes  constitute  progress  and 
seem  to  be  the  roads  to  happiness.  Get  rich,  have 
horses,  autos,  beautiful  things  in  the  house,  servants,  go 
where  you  please  and  when  you  please,  —  this  is  hap- 
piness. The  rich  man  knows  it  is  not,  and  so  does  the 
wise  man.  Desires  grow  with  each  acquisition,  the  ca- 
pacity for  satisfaction  diminishes  with  every  gratifica- 
tion, novelty  disappears  and  with  the  growth  of  taste 
little  disharmonies  offend  deeply. 

Some  men  have  reacted  in  this  way  against  gratifica- 
tion and  satisfaction,  against  the  building  up  of  needs 
and  tastes,  and  in  every  age  we  hear  of  the  "  simple 
life,"  the  happy,  contented  life,  where  needs  are  few 
and  things  are  "  natural."  The  ascetic  ideal  of  renun- 
ciation is  the  dominant  note  in  Buddhism  and  Chris- 
tianity; fly  from  the  pleasures  of  this  world,  give  up 
and  renounce,  for  all  is  vanity  and  folly.  To  every 
struggler  this  seems  true  when  the  battle  is  hardest, 
when  achievement  seems  futile  and  empty,  and  when 
he  whispers  to  himself,  "  What  is  it  all  about,  anyway?  " 
To  stop  struggling,  to  desire  only  the  plainest  food,  the 
plainest  clothes,  to  live  without  the  needless  multipli- 
cation of  refinements,  to  work  at  something  essential 
for  daily  bread,  to  stop  competing  with  one's  neighbor 
in  clothes,  houses,  ornaments,  tastes, —  it  seems  so 
pleasant  and  restful.  But  the  competition  gets  keener, 
the  struggle  harder,  tastes  multiply,  yesterday's  luxury 
is  to-day's  need  —  to  what  end? 

Will  mankind  ever  accept  a  modified  asceticism  as 
its  goal?  I  think  it  will  be  forced  to,  but  it  may  be 
that  the  wish  is  father  to  the  thought.  Sometimes  it 
seems  as  if  the  real  crucifixion  for  every  one  of  us  is 
in  our  contending  desires  and  tastes,  in  the  artificial 


HUMOR  AND  PLEASURE  SEEKING       327 

competing  standards  that  are  mislabeled  refinement. 
To  be  finicky  is  to  court  anhedonia,  and  the  joy  of  life 
is  in  robust  tastes  not  easily  offended  and  easily 
gratified. 

Perhaps  this  is  irrelevant  in  a  chapter  on  play  and 
recreation,  but  it  is  easily  seen  that  much  of  play  is  a 
revolt  against  refinement  and  taste,  just  as  much  as 
humor  is  directed  against  them.  In  play  we  allow  our- 
selves to  shout,  laugh  aloud  and  to  be  unrefined;  we 
welcome  dirt  and  disorder;  we  forget  clothes  and  man- 
ners ;  we  are  "  natural,"  i.  e.,  unrefined.  The  higher  we 
build  our  tastes  the  more  we  need  play.  If  such  a  thing 
as  a  "  state  of  nature  "  could  be  reached,  play  and  rec- 
reation in  the  adult  sense  would  hardly  more  than  exist. 


CHAPTER  XVI 

RELIGIOUS  CHAEACTERS.      DISHARMONY  IN  CHARACTER 

I  FIND  in  Williani  James'  "  Varieties  of  Religious 
Experience",  the  following  definition  of  religion:  "Re- 
ligion, therefore,  as  I  shall  ask  you  arbitrarily  to  take 
it,  shall  mean  for  us  the  feelings,  acts  and  experiences 
of  individuals  in  their  solitude  so  far  as  they  compre- 
hend themselves  to  stand  in  relation  to  whatever  they 
may  consider  the  divine." 

It  seems  to  me  the  common  man  would  as  soon  under- 
stand Einstein  as  this  definition.  In  fact,  the  religious 
trends  of  the  men  and  women  in  this  world  have  many 
sources  and  are  no  more  unified  than  their  humor  is. 
Whether  all  peoples,  no  matter  how  low  in  culture,  have 
had  religion  cannot  be  settled  by  a  study  of  the  present 
inhabitants  of  the  world,  for  every  one  of  these,  though 
savage,  has  tradition  and  some  culture.  Theoretically, 
for  the  one  who  accepts  some  form  of  evolution  as  true, 
at  some  time  in  man's  history  he  has  first  asked  himself 
some  of  the  questions  answered  by  religion. 

For  my  part,  as  I  read  the  anthropologists  (whose  an- 
swers to  the  question  of  the  origin  of  religion  I  regard 
as  the  only  valid  ones,  since  they  are  the  only  ones  with- 
out prejudice  and  with  some  regard  for  scientific  meth- 
od),  it  is  the  practical  needs  of  man,  his  curiosity  and  his 
tendency  to  explain  by  human  force,  which  are  the  first 
sources  of  the  religions.  How  to  get  good  crops,  how  to 
catch  fish  and  game,  how  to  win  over  enemies,  how  and 
whom  to  marry,  what  to  do  to  be  strong  and  successful 


DISHARMONY  IN  CHARACTER  329 

as  individual  and  group,  found  various  answers  in  the  ta- 
boo, the  prayer,  the  ceremony  and  the  priest,  magician 
and  scientist.  Curiosity  as  to  what  was  behind  each  phe- 
nomenon of  nature  and  the  tendency  of  man  to  personal- 
ize all  force,  as  well  as  the  awe  and  admiration  aroused 
by  the  strong,  wise  and  crafty  contemporary  and  ances- 
tor brought  into  the  world  the  "  old  man-cult,  "  ancestor- 
worship,  gods  and  goddesses  of  ranging  degrees  and 
power,  but  very  much  like  men  and  women  except  for 
power  and  longevity.  Certain  natural  phenomena  — 
death,  sleep,  trance,  epileptic  attack  —  all  played  their 
part,  bringing  about  ideas  of  the  soul,  immortality,  pos- 
session, etc.  With  culture  and  the  growth  of  inhibi- 
tion and  knowledge  and  the  use  of  art  and  symbols,  the 
primitive  beliefs  modified  their  nature ;  the  gods  became 
one  God,  who  was  gradually  stripped  of  his  human  de- 
sires, wishes,  partialities  and  attributes  until  for  the 
majority  of  the  cultivated  he  becomes  Nature,  which  in 
the  end  is  a  collection  of  laws  in  which  one  hopes 
there  is  a  unifying  purpose.  But  the  vast  majority  of 
the  world,  even  in  the  so-called  civilized  countries,  wor- 
ship taboos,  symbols,  have  a  modified  polytheistic  belief 
or  a  personalized  God,  still  attempt  to  persuade  the 
Power  in  their  own  behalf,  to  act  favorably  to  their  own 
purposes  and  follow  those  who  claim  knowledge  of  the 
divine  and  inscrutable,  —  the  priest,  minister,  rabbi, 
the  man  of  God,  in  a  phrase. 

A  part  of  religious  feeling  arises  in  civilized  man,  at 
least,  from  the  feeling  of  awe  in  the  presence  of  the 
vast  forces  of  nature.  Here  science  has  contributed  to 
religious  feeling,  for  as  one  looks  at  the  stars,  his  soul 
bows  in  worship  mainly  because  the  astronomer,  the 
scientist,  has  told  him  that  every  twinkling  point  is  a 
great  sun  surrounded  by  planets,  and  that  the  light 


330  THE  FOUNDATIONS  OF  PERSONALITY 

from  them  must  travel  unimaginable  millions  of  miles 
to  reach  him.  As  the  world  forces  become  impersonal 
they  become  more  majestic,  and  a  deeper  feeling  is 
evoked  in  their  presence.  Science  aids  true  religion  by 
increasing  awe,  by  increasing  knowledge. 

A  great  factor  in  religion  is  the  longing  to  compen- 
sate for  death  and  suffering.  Religion  represents  a  re- 
action against  fear,  horror  and  humiliation.  It  is  a  cry 
of  triumph  in  the  face  of  what  otherwise  is  disaster. 
"  I  am  not  man,  the  worm,  sick,  old,  doomed  to  die ; 
I  am  the  heir  of  the  divine  and  will  live  forever,  happy 
and  blessed."  Whether  religious  teaching  is  true  or 
not,  its  great  value  lies  in  the  happiness  and  surety  of 
those  who  believe. 

In  its  very  highest  sense  the  religious  life  is  an  ef- 
fort to  identify  oneself  with  the  largest  purpose  in  the 
world.  All  cooperative  purposes  are  thus  religious,  all 
competitive  nonreligious.  The  selfish  is  therefore  op- 
posed to  the  altruistic  purpose,  the  narrow  to  the  broad. 
Good  is  the  symbol  for  the  purposes  that  seek  the  wel- 
fare of  all:  evil  is  the  symbol  of  those  who  seek  the 
welfare  of  a  person  or  a  group,  regardless  of  the  rest. 

If  this  definition  is  correct,  then  every  reformer  is 
religious  and  every  self-seeker,  though  he  wear  all  the 
symbols  of  a  religion  and  pray  three  times  a  day,  is 
irreligious.  I  admit  no  man  or  woman  to  the  fellow- 
ship of  the  religious  unless  in  his  heart  he  seeks  some 
purpose  that  will  lift  the  world  out  of  discord  and  into 
harmony. 

The  power  of  the  human  being  to  believe  in  the  face  of 
opposed  fact,  inconsistency  and  unfavorable  result  is 
nowhere  so  well  exemplified  as  in  religion.  I  do  not 
speak  of  the  untold  crimes  and  inhumanities  done  in  the 
name  of  religion,  of  human  sacrifice,  persecution,  relig- 


DISHARMONY  IN  CHARACTER  331 

ious  war,  —  these  are  parts  of  a  chapter  in  human  his- 
tory outside  of  the  province  of  this  book  and  almost  too 
horrible  to  be  contemplated.  But  men  have  believed 
(and  do  believe)  that  some  among  them  knew  what 
God  wanted,  that  certain  procedures,  tricks  and  cere- 
monies conveyed  sanctity  and  surety ;  that  cosmic  events 
like  storms,  droughts,  eclipses  and  epidemics  had  per- 
sonal human  meanings,  that  Infinite  Wisdom  would  be 
guided  in  action  by  the  prayers  of  ignorance,  self-seek- 
ing and  hatred,  etc.,  etc.  The  savage  who  believes  that 
his  medicine  man's  antics,  paint  and  feathers  will  bring 
rain  and  fertile  soil  has  his  counterpart  in  the  civi- 
lized man  who  believes  that  this  or  that  ceremonial  and 
professed  belief  insures  salvation.  Faith  is  beautiful 
in  the  abstract,  but  in  the  concrete  it  is  often  the  origin 
of  superstition  and  amazing  folly.*  However  crudely 
intelligence  and  honest  scientific  effort  may  work,  they 
soar  in  a  heaven  far  above  the  abyss  of  credulity. 

True  religion  in  the  sense  I  have  used  the  word  has 
faith  in  it,  the  faith  that  there  is  a  purpose  in  the  uni- 
verse, though  it  seems  impossible  for  us  to  discover  it. 
In  the  personal  character  it  seeks  to  establish  altruistic 
feeling  and  conduct,  though  it  does  not  rule  out  as 
unworthy  self-feeling  or  seeking.  It  merely  subordi- 
nates them.  It  does  not  deny  the  validity  of  pleasure, 
of  the  sensuous  pleasures ;  it  does  not  set  its  face  against 
drinking,  eating,  sexual  love,  play  and  entertainment, 
but  it  urges  a  valid  purpose  as  necessary  for  happiness 
and  morality.  It  does  not  glorify  faith  as  against  rea- 
son, emotion  as  against  intelligence ;  on  the  contrary,  it 

*It  would  be  amusing  were  it  not  sad  to  see  how  remarkably  well 
some  philosophers  use  their  intelligence  and  logic  to  prove  the  in- 
validity of  intelligence  and  logic.  They  praise  emotion,  instinct  and 
"  intuition  "  and  such  modes  of  knowing  and  acting,  yet  their  works 
are  closely  argued,  reasoned  and  appeal  throughout  to  the  intelligence 
of  their  readers  for  acceptance. 


332  THE  FOUNDATIONS  OF  PERSONALITY 

holds  that  reason  and  intelligence  are  the  governing 
factors  in  human  life  and  only  by  use  of  them  do  we 
rise  from  the  beast. 

So  the  religious  life  of  those  we  study  will  be  of  great 
importance  to  us.  In  the  majority  of  cases  we  shall 
find  that  social  heredity,  tradition  and  backing  will 
play  the  dominant  role,  in  that  most,  in  name  at  least, 
live  and  die  in  the  faith  in  which  they  were  bom.  We 
find  those  who  identify  form  and  ceremonial  with  reli- 
gion (the  majority),  others  who  identify  it  with  ethics 
and  morality,  and  who  can  conceive  no  righteousness 
out  of  it.  Then  there  is  the  strictly  modem  type  of 
person  to  whom  right  conduct  is  held  to  have  nothing 
to  do  with  religious  belief  and  who  measures  Christian, 
Jew,  Mohammedan  and  agnostic  by  their  acts  and  not 
at  all  by  their  dogma,  and  who  thus  relegates  religion, 
in  the  ordinary  use  of  the  word,  to  a  rather  useless  place 
in  human  life.  Orthodoxy,  piety,  tolerance  and  skep- 
ticism represent  attitudes  towards  organized  religion: 
altruism,  sympathy,  good  will,  and  fellowship  are  the 
measurements  of  the  unorganized  religion  whose  mission 
it  is  to  find  the  purpose  of  life. 

We  have  spoken  throughout  of  man  as  a  mosaic  of 
character,  and  we  must  modify  this  statement.  A  mo- 
saic is  a  static  collection,  whereas  a  man  has  character 
struggles,  balance  and  overbalance.  Really  to  know  a 
man  is  to  get  at  the  proportionate  power  of  his  va- 
rious trends,  to  understand  his  harmonies  and  dis- 
harmonies. 

Character  development  is  the  story  of  the  unification 
of  the  traits  or  characters.  Disharmony,  disproportion 
of  traits  and  characters  may  be  progressive  and  lead 
to  disaster  and  mental  disease,  or  a  balance  may  be 
reached  after  a  struggle  and  what  we  call  reform  takes 


DISHARMONY  IN  CHARACTER  333 

place.  Though  our  social  life  tends  to  narrow  and  re- 
press character,  it  also  tends  to  harmonize  it  by  the 
preventing  of  excess  development  of  certain  traits.  The 
social  person  is  on  the  whole  well  balanced,  though  he 
may  be  mediocre.  On  the  other  hand,  the  non-social 
person  usually  tends  to  unbalance  in  the  sense  that 
he  becomes  odd  and  eccentric. 

What  are  the  chief  disharmonies?  I  mean,  of 
course,  glaring  disharmonies,  for  no  one  is  of  har- 
monious development,  with  intelligence,  emotions,  in- 
stincts, desires,  pui'poses  in  cooperation  with  each  other. 
This  I  propose  to  consider  in  more  detail  in  the  next 
chapter,  on  some  character  types,  but  it  will  be  of  use  to 
sketch  the  great  disharmonies. 

Character  is  dynamic,  and  a  fundamental  dishar- 
mony, even  if  not  noticeable  early  in  life,  may  progress 
to  the  point  of  disruption  of  the  personality.  Thus  an 
individual  who  is  strongly  egoistic  in  his  purposes  and 
aims  may  succeed  if  at  the  same  time  he  is  determined, 
intelligent  and  shrewd.  But  let  us  suppose  he  has  a 
son  who  is  as  strongly  egoistic,  is  as  determined,  but 
lacks  intelligence  and  shrewdness.  Not  becoming  suc- 
cessful, this  person  ascribes  his  failure  to  others  and 
develops  ideas  of  persecution. 

Again,  a  true  poet  is  a  person  of  keen  sensibilities, 
but  he  must  possess  at  the  same  time  imaginative  intel- 
ligence and  the  power  of  words.  Let  these  be  joined 
in  proper  proportions,  and  his  verse  becomes  ours  and 
we  hail  him  as  a  poet.  But  let  him  lack  the  power  of 
words,  and  though  he  sweat  with  a  desire  to  write  he  is 
a  failure  or  a  hack  poet,  making  up  by  industry  what 
he  lacks  in  beauty.  Suppose  there  is  a  man  deeply  pas- 
sionate, thrilled  by  the  beauty  of  women  and  desiring 
them  with  a  fierce  ardor,  and  yet  he  has  strong  inhibi- 


334  THE  FOUNDATIONS  OF  PERSONALITY 

tions,  great  purposes  which  hold  him  steady.  Then 
throughout  life  he  seems  calm,  chaste  and  controlled, 
and  no  one  knows  of  the  turmoil  and  battle  within  him. 
We  may  suppose  that  old  age  ^  or  a  sickness  lowers  his 
inhibiting  qualities,  and  a  startling  change  in  conduct 
results,  one  that  we  can  scarcely  believe  and  which  we 
are  inclined  to  call  a  complete  transformation  of  per- 
sonality. In  reality,  a  disharmony  has  occurred,  some 
trend,  has  been  released,  and  conduct,  which  is  a  result- 
ant, changes  its  direction. 

Inhibition  control,  may  develop  later  than  it  should, 
as  I  have  already  mentioned.  At  adolescence  sex  desire 
comes  suddenly  into  play,  but  usually  in  one  way  or 
another  there  are  checks  upon  its  effects  already  estab- 
lished. But  often  there  is  not,  and  the  boy  or  girl 
plunges  into  a  sex  life  that  brings  them  into  violent 
conflict  with  themselves  and  society.  Despite  their  ef- 
forts the  non-ethical  conduct  continues;  despite  their 
tears  and  vows  to  reform  they  are  swept  by  "  tempta- 
tion "  into  diflftculty.  Then  suddenly  or  gradually, 
perhaps  long  after  every  one  despairs  of  them,  the  inhi- 
bition appears,  and  they  settle  down  to  a  controlled 
life.  What  has  happened?  We  cannot  say  in  anatomi- 
cal terms,  but  from  a  psychological  standpoint  the  func- 
tion of  inhibition,  delayed  in  its  appearance,  finally 
comes  on  the  scene.  We  see  this  delay  in  other  phases 
of  character;  there  is  often  delay  in  sex  feeling,  in  the 
interest  in  work,  in  love  of  the  beautiful,  in  control  of 
anger,  etc.  Take  the  last  mentioned :  an  irascible  child 
grows  into  an  irascible  adolescent  and  even  into  a  sim- 
ilar adult,  flaring  up  under  the  least  provocation,  to 
the  dismay  and  disgust  of  others  and  himself.     "He 

^  Sexual  misdemeanor  is  not  uncommon  in  old  men  who  have  hitherto 
been  of  hallowed  reputation. 


DISHARMONY  IN  CHARACTER  335 

can't  control  himself,"  so  say  others,  and  so  thinks  he. 
He  vows  reform,  but  nothing  seems  to  help.  Then  like 
a  miracle  comes  the  longed-for  inhibition ;  anger  is  still 
there  when  his  will  is  crossed  or  his  opinion  scouted, 
but  a  firm  hand  is  on  it,  and  he  maintains  a  calm  he  had 
despaired  of  reaching. 

Man  is  a  bundle  of  disharmonies,  as  the  great  Eli 
Metchnikofif  pointed  out,  physically,  psychologically  and 
sociologically.  When  these  disharmonies  are  within 
average  limits  we  do  not  notice  them;  when  they  are 
greater  in  degree  they  bring  about  conduct  that  at  once 
claims  attention.  Sometimes  a  disharmony  is  merely 
an  excess  development  of  some  ability,  in  which  case,  if 
the  ability  is  socially  valuable,  we  have  the  talented 
person  or  the  genius.  This  is  often  the  case  with  the 
artistic  abilities  and  also  with  the  physical  powers.  If 
the  disharmony  involve  an  instinct,  an  emotion  or  cer- 
tain phases  of  the  intelligence,  we  are  brought  face  to 
face  with  the  abnormal. 

There  is,  of  course,  disharmony  through  ordinary  de- 
fect as  in  feeble-mindedness,  as  in  absence  of  some  es- 
sential emotion  or  instinct.  These  are  hopeless  situa- 
tions and  belong  in  the  grim  field  of  psychopathology. 
Often  what  seems  to  be  a  defect  is  a  "  sleeping  "  quality, 
and  one  that  will  awaken  under  appropriate  circum- 
stance. Conspicuously,  maternal  love  is  of  this  nature. 
One  sees  a  girl  who  has  no  interest  in  children,  consid- 
ers them  bores  and  nuisances,  who  marries  with  the 
hope  she  will  be  childless,  and  with  the  first  baby  be- 
comes a  passionately  devoted  mother,  even  fiercely  ma- 
ternal. 

In  the  following  pages  I  shall  sketch  some  prominent 
character  types.  This  has  been  done  by  such  masters 
as  Aristotle,  Spinoza,  Kant,  La  Bruyere,  Stewart,  Ribot, 


336  THE  FOUNDATIONS  OF  PERSONALITY 

Mill,  etc.,  but  with  a  different  purpose  and  starting 
point  than  mine. 

Every  great  novelist  is  a  professor  of  character  depic- 
tion. Witness  Scrooge,  Pecksniff,  Mark  Tapley,  Pick- 
wick, Sam  Weller  and  his  father,  created  by  Dickens; 
the  four  musketeers,  especially  D'Artagnon,  of  Dumas; 
Amelia  and  Rebecca  Sharp,  George,  and  the  Major  of 
Thackeray ;  Jane  Austen's  heroines  and  George  Eliot's 
men  and  women;  the  narrators  in  the  famous  Canter- 
bury Inn,  the  soldiers  of  Kipling,  the  Shylocks,  Mac- 
beths,  Rosalinds  and  Falstaff  s  of  the  greatest  dramatist ; 
the  thousand  and  one  fictitious  and  yet  real  figures  of 
literature. 

The  temperament  studies  by  the  psychologists  and 
philosophers  have  been  too  broad  and  too  classical  to 
be  of  practical  value.  Sanguine  and  choleric  tempera- 
ment, the  bilious,  the  nervous  and  the  phlegmatic,  the 
quick  and  the  slow,  all  these  are  broad  divisions,  and  no 
man  really  exemplifies  them.  What  I  propose  to  do  is 
less  ambitious,  but  perhaps  more  practical.  I  shall  take 
a  few  of  the  qualities  with  which  the  previous  pages 
have  concerned  themselves  and  show  how  they  work  out 
in  individuals  mainly  sketched  from  life. 

It  will  seem  that  perhaps  a  disproportionate  number 
are  pathological,  but  I  wish  to  insist  that  there  is  no 
sharp  line  between  the  "  normal  "  and  "  pathological  "  in 
character.  In  fact,  normality  is  an  abstract  concep- 
tion, an  ideal  never  reached  or  seen,  and  each  of  us  only 
approaches  that  ideal  in  greater  or  lesser  degree.  More- 
over, certain  deviations  from  the  normal  are  useful,  as 
the  assemblage  of  qualities  that  make  the  genius  or  the 
reformer  of  certain  types.  Others  are  not  useful,  or  at 
least  not  useful  in  the  environment  and  age  in  which  the 
deviated  person  finds  himself.    Undoubtedly  the  abnor- 


DISHARMONY  IN  CHARACTER  337 

mal  have  helped  found  religions,  for  one  who  "  hears  " 
God  and  "  sees  "  him  as  do  many  of  the  insane,  if  intel- 
ligent and  eloquent  at  the  same  time,  easily  convinces 
others ;  but  if  such  a  person  occurs  in  a  group  with  well- 
established  belief  and  resistant  to  the  new,  the  insane 
hospital  soon  lodges  the  new  apostle. 

I  shall  not  attempt  to  consider  all  the  varied  shades 
of  harmony  and  disharmony,  the  extraordinary  variety 
of  types.  There  are  as  many  varieties  of  persons  as 
there  are  people,  and  the  mathematical  possibilities  ex- 
ceed computation.  Those  depicted  are  some  of  the  out- 
standing types,  in  whom  qualities  and  combinations  of 
qualities  can  easily  be  seen  at  work. 


CHAPTER  XVII 

SOME  CHARACTER  TYPES 

There  is  one  kind  of  energy  discharger  that  we  may 
call  the  hyperkinetic,  controlled  practical  type.  This 
group  is  characterized  by  great  and  constant  activity, 
well  controlled  by  purpose,  with  eagerness  and  enthusi- 
asm manifested  in  each  act  but  not  excessively. 

1.  A.  is  one  of  these  people.  In  school  he  specialized 
in  athletics  and  was  a  fine  all-round  player  in  almost 
every  sport.  When  he  left  high  school  to  go  to  work 
he  at  once  entered  business.  His  employers  soon  found 
him  to  be  a  tireless  worker,  steady  and  purposeful  in 
everything.  In  addition  to  carrying  on  his  duties  by 
day,  A.  studied  nights,  carefully  choosing  his  subjects 
so  that  they  related  directly  to  his  business.  Despite 
the  fact  that  his  work  was  hard  and  his  studies  exacting, 
A.  had  energy  enough  left  to  join  social  organizations 
and  to  take  a  leading  part  in  their  affairs.  He  became 
quickly  known  as  one  of  those  busy  people  who  always 
are  ready  to  take  on  more  work.  Naturally  this  led 
to  his  becoming  a  leader,  first  in  his  social  relations 
and  second  in  his  business.  Always  practical  in  his 
judgments  and  actions,  A.  fell  in  love  with  the  daughter 
of  a  rich  family  and  married  her,  with  the  full  approval 
of  her  relatives,  who  were  keen  enough  to  see  that  his 
energy,  power  and  control  were  destined  for  success. 

The  leading  traits  that  A.  manifests  hinge  around  his 
high  energy  and  control.  He  is  honest  and  conven- 
tional, devoted  to  the  ideals  of  his  group  and  admires 


SOME  CHARACTER  TYPES  339 

learning,  but  he  is  not  in  any  sense  a  scholar.  He  is 
a  poor  speaker,  in  the  ordinaiy  sense  of  that  term,  but 
curiously  effective,  nevertheless,  because  his  earnest  en- 
ergy and  sturdy  common  sense  win  approval  as  "  not  a 
theorist."  But  mainly  he  wins  because  he  is  tireless 
in  energy  and  enthusiasm  and  yet  has  yoked  these  qual- 
ities to  ordinary  purposes.  The  average  man  he  meets 
understands  him  thoroughly,  sympathizes  with  him 
completely  and  accepts  him  as  a  leader  after  his  own 
heart. 

So  A.  has  become  rich  and  respected.  As  time  goes 
on,  as  he  is  brought  more  and  more  into  contact  with 
large  affairs  outside  of  business;  as  a  trustee  of  hospi- 
tals and  a  director  of  charitable  organizations,  he 
broadens  out  but  not  into  an  "  unsafe  "  attitude.  He 
pities  the  unfortunate  but  is  not  truly  sympathetic,  in 
that  it  rarely  occurs  to  him  that  success  and  failure 
are  relative,  that  an  accident  might  have  shipwrecked 
his  fortunes  and  that  his  good  qualities  are  as  innate  as 
his  complexion.  For  this  man  prides  himself  on  his 
strong  will  and  courage,  whereas  he  merely  has  within 
him  a  fine  engine  in  whose  construction  he  had  no  part. 

2.  The  hyperkinetic,  controlled,  impractical  person. 
B.  is,  in  the  fundamentals  of  energy  and  control,  singu- 
larly like  A.,  but  because  of  the  nature  of  his  interests 
and  purposes  their  lives  have  completely  diverged  so 
that  no  one  would  ordinarily  recognize  the  kinship  in 
type.  B.  is  and  always  has  been  a  worker,  enthusiastic 
and  enduring,  and  he  has  stuck  to  his  last  with  a  fidelity 
that  is  remarkable.  He  is  very  likable  in  the  ordinary 
sense,  —  pleasant  to  look  at,  cheerful,  ready  to  joke, 
laugh  or  to  help  the  other  fellow.  Nevertheless,  he  has 
only  a  few  friends  and  is  a  distinctly  disappointed  man 


340  THE  FOUNDATIONS  OF  PERSONALITY 

at  heart,  because  his  interests  are  in  the  ordinary  sense, 
impractical. 

B.  early  became  interested  in  physiology.  From  the 
very  start  he  found  in  the  workings  of  the  human  body 
a  fascination  that  concentrated  his  efforts.  Poor,  he 
worked  hard  enough  to  obtain  scholarships  and  fellow- 
ships in  one  university  after  another  until  finally  he 
became  a  Ph.  D.  Here  was  a  great  error  from  the  prac- 
tical standpoint ;  for  had  he  become  an  M.  D.,  he  would 
have  had  a  profession  that  offered  an  independent  finan- 
cial future.  But,  in  his  zeal,  he  did  not  wish  to  take 
on  the  extended  program  of  the  physician,  and  he  saw 
clearly  that  he  might  become  a  better  scientist  as  a 
Ph.  D.  He  became  a  teacher  in  one  school  after  another, 
did  a  good  deal  of  research  work,  but  has  not  been  for- 
tunate enough  to  make  any  epoch-making  discoveries. 
He  is  one  of  those  splendid,  painstaking,  energetic  men 
found  in  every  university  who  turn  out  good  pieces  of 
work  of  which  only  a  few  know  anything,  and  from 
which  in  the  course  of  time  some  genius  or  lucky  scien- 
tist culls  a  few  facts  upon  which  to  build  up  a  great 
theory  or  a  new  doctrine.  He  married  one  of  his  own 
students,  a  fine  woman  but  unluckily  not  very  strong, 
and  so  there  fell  on  him  many  a  domestic  duty  that  a 
thousand  extra  dollars  a  year  would  have  turned  over  to 
a  maid. 

Thus  B.  is  an  obscure  but  respected  member  of  the 
faculty  of  a  small  university.  He  teaches  well,  though 
he  dislikes  it,  and  he  is  happy  at  the  times  when  he  works 
hard  at  some  physiological  problem.  He  loves  his  fam- 
ily and  has  vowed  that  his  son  will  be  a  business  man. 
He  feels  inferior  as  he  contemplates  his  obscure  exist- 
ence, with  its  precarious  financial  state,  its  drudgery 
and  most  of  all  the  gradual  disappearance  of  his  ideals. 


SOME  CHARACTER  TYPES  341 

He  is  frank  to  himself  alone,  wishes  he  had  made  money, 
but  is  apt  to  sneer  at  the  world  of  the  "  fat  and  suc- 
cessful "  as  less  than  his  intellectual  equal.  He  com- 
pares his  own  rewards  with  that  of  the  successful  man 
knowing  less  and  with  a  narrower  outlook. 

Thus,  through  success,  A.  is  broadening  and  becoming 
something  of  an  idealist.  B.  is  narrowing  and 
through  failure  is  losing  his  ideals.  This  is  not  an  un- 
common effect  of  success  and  failure.  Where  success 
leads  to  arrogance  and  conceit  it  narrows,  but  where  the 
character  withstands  this  result  the  increased  experience 
and  opportunity  is  of  great  value  to  character.  Failure 
may  embitter  and  thus  narrow  through  envy  and  lost 
energy,  but  also  it  may  strip  away  conceit  and  overesti- 
mation  and  thus  lead  to  a  richer  insight  into  life. 

3.  The  hyperkinetic,  uncontrolled  or  shallow.  This 
type,  although  quick  and  apparently  energetic,  is  de- 
ficient in  a  fundamental  of  the  personality,  in  the  or- 
ganizing energy.  This  deficiency  may  extend  into  all 
phases  of  the  mental  life  or  in  only  a  few  phases.  Thus 
we  see  people  whose  thinking  is  rapid,  energetic,  but 
they  cannot  "  stick  "  to  one  line  of  thought  long  enough 
to  reach  a  goal.  Others  are  similarly  situated  in  regard 
to  purposes;  they  are  enthusiastic,  easily  stirred  into 
activity,  but  rarely  do  their  purposes  remain  fixed  long 
enough  for  success.  As  a  rule  this  class  is  inconstant  in 
affections,  though  warm  and  sympathetic.  They  gush 
but  never  organize  their  philanthropic  efforts,  so  that 
they  rarely  do  any  real  good.  Often  the  most  lovable 
of  people,  they  are  at  the  same  time  the  despair  of  those 
who  know  them  best. 

M.  is  a  woman  who  makes  a  fine  first  impression,  is 
very  pretty,  with  nice  manners  and  a  quick,  flattering 
interest  in  every  one  she  meets.     She  is  usually  classed 


342   THE  FOUNDATIONS  OF  Pl^RSONALITY 

as  intelligent  because  she  is  vivacious,  that  is,  her  mind 
follows  the  trend  of  things  quickly,  and  she  marshals 
whatever  she  knows  very  readily.  As  one  who  knows 
her  well  says,  "  She  shows  all  her  goods  the  first  time. 
You  really  do  not  know  how  slender  her  stock  in  trade 
is  until  you  see  the  same  goods  and  tricks  every  time 
you  meet  her."     Needless  to  say  her  critic  is  a  woman. 

M.  is  interested  in  something  new  each  week.  The 
"  new  "  usually  fascinates  her,  and  she  becomes  so  ex- 
traordinarily busy  that  she  hardly  has  time  to  eat  or 
sleep.  She  is  always  put  on  committees  if  the  organiza- 
tion heads  do  not  know  her,  but  if  they  do,  she  is  care- 
fully slated  for  something  of  no  importance.  After  a 
short  time  her  interest  has  shifted  to  something  else. 
Thus  she  passes  from  work  in  behalf  of  blind  babies  to 
raising  funds  for  a  home  for  indigent  actors;  from  en- 
ergy spent  in  philanthropy  to  energy  spent  in  learning 
the  latest  dances.  Her  enthusiasm  never  cools  off, 
though  its  goal  always  changes. 

Fortunately  she  is  married  to  a  rich  man  who  views 
her  with  affection  and  a  shrug  of  his  shoulders.  Her 
children  know  her ;  now  and  then,  she  becomes  extraor- 
dinarily interested  in  their  welfare,  much  to  their  dis- 
gust and  rebellion,  for  they  have  long  since  sized  her  up. 

She  has  often  been  on  the  verge  of  a  love  affair  with 
some  man  who  is  professionally  interested  in  something 
into  which  she  has  leaped  for  a  short  time.  She  raves 
about  him,  follows  him,  flatters  and  adores  him,  and 
then,  before  the  poor  fellow  knows  where  he  is  at,  she 
is  out  of  love  and  off  somewhere  else.  This  mutability 
of  affection  has  undoubtedly  saved  her  from  disaster. 

Were  she  not  rich,  M.  would  be  one  of  the  social 
problems  that  the  social  workers  cannot  understand  or 
handle,  e.  g.,  there  is  a  type  who  never  sticks  to  any- 


SOME  CHARACTER  TYPES  343 

thing,  not  because  he  is  bored  quickly,  or  is  inefficient, 
but  because  he  is  at  the  mercy  of  the  new  and  irrele- 
vant. Without  sufficient  means  he  throws  up  his 
job  and  tries  to  get  the  new  work  he  longs  to  do.  Some- 
times he  fails  to  get  it,  and  then  he  becomes  an  unem- 
ployed problem. 

This  type  of  uncontrolled  energy  reaches  its  height 
in  the  manical  or  manic  phase  of  the  disease  already 
described  as  manic  depressive  insanity.  The  "  manic 
personality,"  which  need  not  become  insane,  is  char- 
acterized by  high  energy,  vivacious  emotions,  rapid  flow 
of  thought  and  irrelevant  associations. 

4.  The  mesokinetic  —  medium  or  average  in  their  en- 
ergy (feeling  and  power)  — run  the  range  of  the  vast 
groups  we  call  the  average.  This  type  is  spurred  on 
by  necessity,  custom  and  habit  to  steady  work  and  steady 
living.  Possessed  of  practical  wisdom,  their  world  is 
narrow,  their  affections  only  called  out  for  their  kin- 
dred and  immediate  friends.  Their  interests  are  largely 
away  from  their  work  and  as  a  rule  do  not  include 
the  past  or  future  of  the  race.  Usually  conservative, 
they  accept  the  moral  standards  as  absolute  and  are 
quick  to  resent  changes  in  custom.  They  follow  lead- 
ers cheerfully,  are  capable  of  intense  loyalty  to  that 
cause  which  they  believe  to  stand  for  their  interests. 
Yet  each  individual  of  the  mass  of  men,  though  he  never 
rises  above  mediocrity,  presents  to  his  intimates  a  group- 
ing of  qualities  and  peculiarities  that  gives  him  a  distinct 
personality. 

C.  is  one  of  those  individuals  whose  mediocre  en- 
ergy has  stood  between  him  and  so-called  success.  At 
present  he  is  forty  and  occupies  about  the  same  position 
that  he  did  at  twenty.  As  a  boy  he  was  fond  of  play 
but  never  excelled  in  any  sport  and  never  occupied  a 


344  THE  FOUNDATIONS  OF  PERSONALITY 

place  of  leadership.  He  had  the  usual  pugnacious  code 
of  boys,  but  because  he  was  friendly  and  good-natured 
rarely  got  into  a  fight.  He  liked  to  read  and  was  rather 
above  the  average  in  intelligence,  but  he  never  tackled 
the  difl&cult  reading,  confining  himself  to  the  "  interest- 
ing "  novel  and  easy  information.  He  left  high  school 
when  he  was  sixteen  and  immediately  on  leaving  he 
dropped  all  study.  He  entered  an  office  as  errand  boy 
and  was  recognized  as  faithful  and  industrious,  but  he 
showed  no  especial  initiative  or  energy.  In  the  course 
of  time  he  was  promoted  from  one  position  to  another 
until  he  became  a  shipper  at  the  age  of  twenty.  Since 
this  time  he  has  remained  at  this  post  without  change, 
except  that  when  he  got  married  and  on  a  few  occasions 
afterward,  when  the  cost  of  living  rose,  his  salary  was 
raised. 

C.  is  married,  and  his  wife  often  "  nags  "  him  because 
he  does  not  get  ahead.  She  tells  him  that  he  has  no 
energy  and  fight  in  him,  that  if  he  would  he  could  do 
better.  Sometimes  he  takes  refuge  in  the  statement 
that  he  has  no  pull,  that  those  who  have  been  pro- 
moted over  his  head  are  favorites  for  some  reason  or 
another,  and  he  rarely  recognizes  the  superiority  of  his 
immediate  superiors,  though  he  is  loyal  enough  to  the 
boss.  He  lives  in  that  "quiet  despair  "  that  Thoreau 
so  aptly  describes  as  the  life  of  the  average  man,  and 
he  seeks  escape  from  it  in  smoking,  in  belonging  to  a 
variety  of  fraternal  organizations,  in  the  movies  and 
the  detective  story.  He  is  a  "good"  father  and  hus- 
band, which  means  that  he  turns  over  all  his  earnings, 
is  faithful  and  kind.  Except  that  he  admonishes  and 
punishes  his  children  when  they  are  "  bad,"  he  takes  no 
constructive  share  in  their  training  and  leaves  that  to 
the  mother,  the  church  and  the  school.     He  and  his 


SOME  CHARACTER  TYPES  345 

wife  are  attached  to  one  another  through  habit  and 
mutual  need,  but  they  have  some  time  since  outlived 
passion  and  intense  affection.  She  has  sized  him  up  as 
a  failure  and  knows  herself  doomed  to  struggle  against 
poverty,  and  he  knows  that  she  understands  him.  This 
mutual  "  understanding "  keeps  them  at  arm's  length 
except  in  the  face  of  danger  or  disaster,  when  they  cling 
to  each  other  for  comfort  and  support.  This  is  the  his- 
tory of  many  a  marriage  that  on  its  surface  is  quiet  and 
peaceful. 

The  hypokinetic  types.  We  cannot  separate  en- 
ergy display  from  enthusiasm,  courage,  intelligence,  per- 
sistent purpose,  etc.  If  I  have  made  myself  clear  in 
the  preceding  pages  of  this  book,  you  will  realize  that 
no  character  of  man  works  alone,  but  all  feeling,  thought 
and  action  is  a  resultant  of  forces.  Nevertheless,  there 
are  those  in  whom  the  fire  of  life  bums  high  and  others 
in  whom  it  bums  low,  and  either  group  may  be  of  totally 
different  qualities  otherwise. 

There  are  people  of  low  energy  discharge,  and  these 
it  seems  to  me  are  of  two  main  kinds,  —  the  one  where 
nothing  seems  to  arouse  or  create  powerful  motives  and 
purposes,  and  the  other  in  whom  the  main  defect  is  a 
rapidly  arising  exhaustion.  The  first  I  call  the  simple 
hypokinetic  group  and  the  other  the  irritable  hypoki- 
netic group. 

The  simple  hypokinetic  person  may  be  one  of  any 
grade  of  intelligence  but  more  commonly  is  of  low 
intelligence.  In  any  school  for  the  feeble-minded  one 
finds  the  apathetic  imbecile,  who  can  be  kept  at  work 
by  goading  and  stimulation  of  one  kind  or  another,  who 
does  not  tire  especially,  but  who  never  works  beyond  a 
low  level  of  speed  and  enthusiasm. 

5.  A  more  interesting  type  is  T.     He  may  be  called 


346  THE  FOUNDATIONS  OF  PERSONALITY 

the  intelligent  hypokinetic,  the  high-grade  failure.  As 
a  baby  he  learned  to  walk  late,  though  he  talked  early 
and  well.  He  played  in  a  leisurely  sort  of  way,  running 
only  when  he  had  to  and  content  as  a  rule  to  be  in  the 
house.  He  was  not  seclusive,  seeming  to  enjoy  the  com- 
pany of  other  children,  but  rarely  made  any  efforts  to 
seek  them  out.  He  was  quick  to  learn  but  showed  only 
a  moderate  curiosity,  and  he  rarely  made  any  investiga- 
tions on  his  own  account.  It  was  noticed  that  he  sel- 
dom asked  "  why  "  in  the  usual  manner  of  intelligent 
children. 

He  did  fairly  well  in  school ;  he  had  a  wonderful  mem- 
ory and  seemed  to  see  very  quickly  into  intricate  prob- 
lems. It  was  always  a  great  surprise  to  his  teachers 
that  he  was  so  bright,  as  one  said,  in  comparison  to  his 
standing.  Once  or  twice  a  zealous  teacher  sought  to 
stimulate  him  into  more  effort  and  study,  but  though 
he  responded  for  a  short  time,  gradually  he  slipped  back 
into  his  own  easy  pace.  He  went  through  high  school, 
and  on  the  basis  of  a  splendid  memory  and  a  keen  intel- 
ligence, which  by  this  time  were  easily  recognized,  he 
was  sent  to  college.  He  took  no  part  in  athletics  and 
little  part  in  the  communal  college  activities.  He  had 
so  good  a  command  of  facts  and  with  this  so  cynical  a 
point  of  view  that  he  became  quite  a  college  character 
and  was  pointed  out  as  a  fellow  who  could  lead  his  class 
if  he  would.  As  a  matter  of  fact,  nothing  could  spur 
him  to  real  competitive  effort. 

We  may  pass  briefly  over  his  life.  After  he  left  col- 
lege, he  drifted  from  one  position  to  another.  Usually 
in  some  hack  literary  line.  Were  it  not  for  a  small  in- 
come he  would  have  starved.  After  a  few  years  he  be- 
come very  fat  and  gross  looking,  and  then  came  a  kindly 
pneumonia  which  carried  him  off. 


SOME  CHARACTER  TYPES  347 

We  must  not  mistake  the  stolid  for  the  hypokinetic. 
There  was  a  classmate  of  mine  in  the  medical  school, 
a  large,  quiet  fellow,  D.  M.,  who  got  by  everything,  as 
the  boys  said,  by  the  skin  of  his  teeth.  He  worked 
without  enthusiasm  or  zeal,  studied  infrequently  and 
managed  to  pass  along  to  his  second  year,  at  about  the 
bottom  of  the  class.  In  that  year  we  took  up  bacteriol- 
ogy, the  "  bug-bear  "  as  one  punster  put  it,  of  the  school. 
Just  what  it  was  about  the  subject  that  aroused  D.  M. 
I  never  knew,  but  a  remarkable  transformation  took 
place.  The  man  changed  over,  studied  hard,  read  out- 
side literature  and  actually  asked  for  the  privilege  of 
working  in  the  laboratory  Sundays  and  holidays  so  that 
he  might  learn  more.  When  this  was  known  to  the 
rest  of  the  class,  there  were  bets  placed  that  he  would 
not  "  last,"  but  quite  to  the  surprise  of  everybody  D.  M. 
gained  in  momentum  as  he  went  along.  As  a  matter 
of  fact,  his  interest  on  the  subject  grew,  and  he  is  now 
a  bacteriologist  of  good  standing.  In  fact,  his  lack  of 
interest  in  other  matters  has  helped  him,  since  he  hap 
no  distracting  tastes  or  pleasures. 

Thus  there  are  persons  of  specialized  interest  and  en- 
ergy, and  it  may  well  be  that  there  is  for  most  of  the 
hypokinetic  a  line  of  work  that  would  act  to  energize 
them.  The  problem,  therefore,  in  each  case  is  to  find 
the  latent  ability  and  interest  and  to  regard  no  case  as 
really  hopeless.  I  say  this  despite  the  fact  that  I  be- 
lieve some  cases  are  hopeless.  The  pessimistic  attitude 
on  the  part  of  parent  or  teacher  kills  effort;  the  opti- 
mistic attitude  fosters  energetic  effort. 

6.  The  irritable  hypokinetic.  Irritability  ^  of  a  path- 
ological type  as  a  phase  of  lowered  energy  is  well  known 

*One  must  take  care  not  to  mistake  the  irritability  which  is  the 
characteristic  of  all  living  tissue  for  the  irritability  here  considered. 


348  THE  FOUNDATIONS  OF  PERSONALITY 

to  every  physiologist  and  in  the  practical  everyday 
world  is  seen  in  the  tired  and  sick.  There  are  people 
who  from  the  very  start  of  life  show  lowered  endurance, 
who  respond  to  certain  stimuli  in  an  excessive  manner 
and  are  easily  exhausted.  This  type  the  neurologist 
calls  the  congenital  neurasthenic,  and  it  may  be  we 
are  dealing  here  with  some  defect  in  the  elimination  of 
fatigue  products.  This,  however,  is  only  a  guess,  and 
the  disease  factor,  if  there  is  any,  is  entirely  unknown. 
I  do  not  pretend  that  the  person  I  am  to  describe  is 
entirely  representative  of  this  group.  Indeed,  no  dozen 
cases  would  show  all  the  symptoms  and  peculiarities  of 
the  irritable  hypokinetic  group. 

E.  is  a  man  at  present  thirty  years  of  age.  In  person 
he  is  of  average  height,  rather  slender,  with  delicate 
features,  somewhat  bald,  quick  in  action  and  speech. 
He  flushes  easily  and  thus  often  has  high  color,  espe- 
cially when  fatigued  or  excited.  This  "  vasomotor  irri- 
tability," as  the  physicians  call  it,  is  quite  common  in 
this  group  of  people,  and  in  fact  in  all  neurasthenia, 
whether  acquired  or  congenital.  Though  I  have  de- 
scribed E.  as  belonging  to  the  slender  type  of  person,  it 
is  necessary  to  say  that  stout,  rugged-looking  people  are 
often  irritable  and  hypokinetic. 

As  a  child  E.  "  never  could  stand  excitement  or 
strain,"  as  his  mother  says.  What  is  meant  is  this; 
that  he  became  overexcited  under  almost  any  circum- 
stances and  became  profoundly  fatigued  afterwards. 
As  we  have  seen,  the  intense  diffusion  of  excitement 
throughout  the  whole  body  is  a  sign  of  the  childish 
and  inferior  organism;  as  maturity  approaches  and 
throughout  childhood  excitability  decreases  and  is  bet- 
ter localized.  When  a  noise  is  heard  an  infant  jumps, 
and  so  do  people  like  E.,  but  the  better  controlled  mere- 


SOME  CHARACTER  TYPES  349 

ly  turn  their  head  and  eyes  to  see  what  the  source  of  the 
noise  may  be.  This  lack  of  control  of  excitement  ex- 
tended in  E.'s  case  to  play,  entertainment,  novelty  of 
any  kind,  crowds  and  especially  to  the  disagreeable  ex- 
citement of  quarrels,  fights,  terrifying  experiences,  etc. 
Under  anger  he  trembled,  grew  pale,  and  his  shouts  and 
screams  were  beyond  control ;  under  fear  he  became  ac- 
tually sick,  vomited  and  showed  a  liability  to  syncope 
of  an  alarming  kind.  E.  was  not  the  selfish  type  of  the 
neurasthenic;  he  was  gentle  and  kind  and  ready  to 
share  with  everybody,  a  lovable  boy  of  an  intensely 
sociable  nature.  Nevertheless,  his  high  excitability  and 
his  quick  fatigue  made  it  necessary  to  shelter  him,  for 
any  effort  at  toughening  merely  brought  about  a 
"  breakdown." 

Here  we  must  reemphasize  the  fundamental  impor- 
tance of  the  fatigue  reactions.  The  normal  fatigue  re- 
action is  to  feel  weary,  to  desire  rest  and  to  be  able  to 
rest  and  sleep.  The  abnormal  reaction,  one  directly  op- 
posed to  the  well-being  of  the  individual,  is  to  feel 
exhausted,  to  become  restless  and  to  find  it  difficult  to 
sleep.  There  are  children  who  thrive  on  excitement 
and  exertion ;  they  sleep  sounder  for  it,  they  recuperate 
readily  and  gain  in  strength  and  endurance  with  every 
ordinary  burden  put  upon  them.  There  are  others  to 
whom  anything  but  the  least  excitement  and  exertion 
acts  as  a  poison,  making  them  restless  and  exhausted. 
Not  all  children  who  show  this  perverse  fatigue  reaction 
grow  up  with  it.  It  may  be  only  a  temporary  phase 
of  their  lives,  but  while  it  lasts  it  is  very  troublesome. 

In  E.'s  case  the  overexcitable  hypokinetic  stage  lasted 
until  about  the  ninth  year,  and  then  there  was  a  great 
improvement,  though  he  still  was  of  the  same  general 
type.    He  became  a  fairly  good  runner  for  a  short  dis- 


350  THE  FOUNDATIONS  OF  PERSONALITY 

tance,  learned  to  swim,  though  he  stood  the  cold  water 
poorly,  was  clever  and  graceful  as  a  dancer  and  was 
quite  popular.  At  sixteen  he  left  school  to  enter  busi- 
ness, because  of  the  straitened  means  of  his  family.  He 
entered  into  adolescent  period  later  and  suffered  greatly 
from  his  sixteenth  to  nineteenth  year  from  fatigue, 
hypochondriacal  fears,  and  had  to  have  a  good  deal  of 
medical  attention  at  this  time.  Sex  questions  perplexed 
him,  for  he  became  quite  passionate  and  at  the  same 
time  had  much  moral  repugnance  to  illicit  relations. 
His  sexual  curiosity  was  intense,  and  he  read  all  man- 
ner of  books  on  the  subject,  went  to  the  burlesque  shows 
on  the  sly  and  almost  became  obsessed  on  sex  matters. 

At  this  stage  he  made  only  a  mediocre  showing  in  his 
business  career,  though  his  evident  honesty  secured  him 
promotion  to  a  clerk's  position.  After  his  nineteenth 
year  he  seemed  to  gain  again  in  energy  and  endurance 
and  was  fairly  well  until  his  twenty-eighth  year,  though 
he  had  to  nurse  his  endurance  at  all  times,  developed 
very  regular  habits  of  sleep,  diet,  etc.,  and  in  this  man- 
ner got  along.  Once  he  had  an  opportunity  to  join  an 
organization  which  would  have  paid  him  a  better  sal- 
ary, but  the  hours  were  irregular,  and  it  would  have 
demanded  much  exertion  and  excitement,  s©  he  passed 
it  by. 

In  1917  he  joined  the  army,  partly  because  of  patriotic 
motives,  partly  because  he  was  convinced  that  army  life 
might  develop  his  endurance  and  energy.  He  was  sent 
to  an  army  post  in  the  South  and  within  two  months 
of  his  entrance  had  "  broken  down."  He  was  sleepless, 
restless,  was  irritable  and  "  jumpy,"  had  lost  appetite 
and  the  feeling  of  endurance.  Life  seemed  intolerable, 
though  he  had  no  desire  to  do  away  with  himself,  for 
he  had  no  quarrel  with  life  itself  but  was  disgusted 


SOME  CHARACTER  TYPES  351 

with  his  inferiority.  He  was  hospitalized,  but  this  did 
little  good  and  he  was  afterwards  discharged  as  medi- 
cally unfit. 

This,  of  course,  hurt  his  pride,  but  essentially  he  was 
greatly  relieved.  He  made  but  slow  improvement  until 
through  the  munificence  of  Uncle  Sam  he  was  given  a 
new  start  in  life  through  the  Vocational  Reeducation 
Board.  Like  many  other  city  men,  he  has  dreamed 
of  the  "  chicken  farm  "  as  the  ideal  occupation  free 
from  too  much  work  and  yet  lucrative.  This,  of  course, 
is  a  mistaken  notion,  but  while  learning  the  work  he  is 
happy  and  is  slowly  regaining  his  energy.  What  time 
will  bring  forth  no  one  can  tell,  but  this  is  certain: 
throughout  his  life  he  will  have  to  rely  on  good  habits, 
carefully  adjusted  to  his  energy,  in  order  to  protect 
himself  from  the  bankruptcy  that  so  easily  comes  on 
him.  A  philosophy  of  life  which  will  help  to  control 
his  irritability  is  necessary,  and  the  intelligent  of  the 
hypokinetic  irritable  acquire  the  habits  and  the  philos- 
ophy necessary  for  their  welfare. 

Any  neurologist  could  cite  any  number  of  such  cases 
with  varying  traits  of  character,  high  intelligence  or 
feeble-minded,  controlled  in  morals  or  uncontrolled, 
happily  or  unhappily  situated,  whose  central  difficulty 
is  an  irritable  and  easily  exhausted  store  of  energy. 
They  are  easily  excited  and  excitement  burns  them  out; 
that  is  the  long  and  short  of  their  situation.  Sex,  love, 
hatred,  anger,  strain,  fear  in  all  its  forms,  illness, — 
all  these  and  many  other  emotions  and  happenings  may 
break  them  down.  Such  people,  and  those  who  care 
for  them,  must  not  make  the  mistake  of  thinking  that 
rough  handling,  strenuosity,  will  cure  what  is  appar- 
ently a  fixed  character. 

There  is  an  irritable,   high-energy  type  —  irritable 


352  THE  FOUNDATIONS  OF  PERSONALITY 

hyperkinetic  —  that  is  well  contrasted  with  the  fore- 
going. This  explosive  personality  works  by  fits  and 
starts  but  does  not  wear  out,  merely,  as  it  were,  settles 
down  to  his  ordinary  pace  when  he  rests  up.  He  is  like 
a  six-day  bicycle  racer  who  plugs  along  but  every  now 
and  then  sprints  like  mad  for  a  few  laps  and  then  comes 
back  to  a  pace  that  would  kill  the  average  rider.  I 
shall  not  trouble  to  cite  such  a  case,  but  I  can  think 
of  at  least  one  man  of  good  attainments  who  is  of  this 
explosive  hyperkinetic  type.  He  responds  to  every  de- 
mand with  a  burst  of  energy,  and  his  quota  of  ordinary 
activities  is  simply  appalling. 

Neglecting  the  further  types  of  energy  display 
for  the  simple  reason  that  this  quality  shades  off  into 
every  conceivable  type  and  is  also  a  part  of  every  na- 
ture, we  turn  to  the  types  of  emotional  mood  display. 
With  these  it  is  necessary  to  consider  excitability  as 
well,  and  the  most  interesting  beings  are  here  our  ob- 
jects of  study. 

I  wish  first  to  emphasize  my  belief  that  where  there 
is  a  great  natural  variation  in  excitability  and  emotion- 
ality in  individuals,  there  is  not  nearly  so  much  in  races 
as  we  think,  and  that  social  heredity  is  tradition  and 
cultural  level  plays  the  more  important  role  in  this. 
My  friend  and  colleague.  Dr.  A.  Warren  Stearns, 
has  made  a  study  which  shows  that  while  the  immigrant 
Italian  is  excitable  and  quick  to  anger  and  of  revengeful 
reactions,  his  American-born  descendent  has  so  far  con- 
trolled and  changed  this  type  of  reaction  that  he  does 
not  especially  figure  in  police  records,  in  murders  or 
assaults.  My  own  studies  of  the  second  and  especially 
the  third  generation  Jew  show  there  is  an  almost  com- 
plete approach  to  the  "  American  "  type  in  emotional 
display,  in  what  is  known  as  poise.     This  third  genera- 


SOME  CHARACTER  TYPES  353 

tion  Jewish-American  has  dropped  all  the  mannerisms 
of  excitability  in  gesture  and  voice,  and  his  adherence 
to  good  form  includes  that  attitude  of  nonchalant 
humor  so  characteristic  of  the  American. 

1.  The  generally  excitable,  overemotional  type.  This 
type  is  more  common  in  the  Latin,  Hebrew  and  Celtic 
races.  In  some  respects  it  corresponds  to  the  hypo- 
kinetic irritable,  but  it  is  not  necessarily  hypokinetic. 
The  artistic  type  of  person,  so  called,  is  of  this  group, 
but  is,  of  course,  talented  as  well.  Talent  need  not  be 
present,  and  there  are  persons  of  no  artistic  ability 
w^hatever  who  show  a  generalized,  excitable-emotional 
temperament.  All  young  children  show  the  main  traits 
of  this  type,  and  there  is  something  essentially  simple 
about  all  these  folk,  no  matter  how  civilized  or  sophisti- 
cated they  get  to  be. 

A.  L.,  a  woman  of  fifty,  belongs  to  this  group.  She 
is  a  Jewess  and  now  a  widow.  All  of  her  life  her  char- 
acter and  temperament  have  been  the  same,  and  though 
her  experiences  have  been  varied  she  has  not  in  any 
essential  altered.  This  last  is  rather  characteristic  of 
the  group,  for  experience  has  but  little  effect  on  their 
emotional  reactions. 

A.  L.  cries  very  easily  and  readily,  but  her  tears  are 
easily  dried  and  her  joy  is  grotesquely  childlike.  She 
is  readily  frightened,  worries  without  restraint  and  finds 
a  melancholy  satisfaction  in  the  worst.  At  the  same 
time,  her  fears  do  not  persist  and  are  easily  dissipated 
by  encouragement  or  good  fortune.  She  is  readily  an- 
gered and  "  raises  a  row  "  with  great  facility  and  with- 
out restraint.  For  this  reason  her  relatives  and  friends 
become  panic-stricken  when  she  becomes  angry,  for  they 
know  that  she  does  not  hesitate  to  make  an  embarrass- 
ing scene.     In  the  efforts  to  conciliate  her  they  are  apt 


354  THE  FOUNDATIONS  OF  PERSONALITY 

to  give  her  her  own  way,  as  a  result  of  which  she  is  the 
proverbial  spoiled  child,  capitalizing  her  weakness. 

Our  Jewess  uses  her  emotions  for  effect,  which  means 
that  she  has  become  theatrical.  Though  there  is  reality 
in  her  emotional  display,  time  and  the  advantages  she 
has  gained  have  brought  enough  finish  and  restraint  to 
her  manifestations  to  gain  the  designation  artistic. 
True,  it  is  a  crude  artistry,  for  intelligence  does  not  suf- 
ficiently guide  it,  and  her  art  is  used  sometimes  indis- 
criminately and  inopportunely.  As  she  grows  older 
the  value  of  her  tears  is  less,  and  she  is  becoming  that 
prime  nuisance,  the  elderly  scold. 

Among  the  emotional  types  well  recognized  by  the 
neurologist  is  that  known  as  the  cyclothymic.  In  the 
individuals  of  this  group  there  is  a  periodicity  to  mood 
(rather  than  to  emotions).  There  is  a  definitely  path- 
ological trend  to  the  cyclothymic,  and  in  its  most 
marked  form  one  sees  the  recurring  depressions  and  ex- 
citement of  Manic  Depressive  Insanity. 

Aside  from  these  pathological  forms,  there  are  per- 
sons who  show  curious  periodic  changes  in  mood.  They 
become  depressed  for  no  especial  reason,  are  "  blue  " 
for  day  after  day  and  then  quickly  return  to  their  nor- 
mal. Sometimes  these  blue  spells  alternate  with  periods 
of  exaltation  and  happiness,  but  in  my  experience  this 
is  far  less  common  than  periodic  blue  spells,  a  kind  of 
recurrent  anhedonia. 

L.  D.  is  ordinarily  what  is  known  as  a  vivacious  per- 
son. Bright,  talkative,  keen  in  her  discriminations,  she 
has  all  her  life  been  at  the  mercy  of  strange  alterations 
in  mood,  alterations  which  come  and  go  without  what 
seems  to  others  adequate  reason. 

As  a  child  L.  D.  was  sick  a  great  deal.  She  showed 
an  unusual  susceptibility  to  infection,  and  it  was  not 


SOME  CHARACTER  TYPES  355 

until  she  was  nine  years  of  age  that  she  attended  school 
regularly.  Her  illnesses  made  it  impossible  to  dis- 
cipline her,  and  so  she  has  always  been  a  bit "  spoiled  ", 
though  her  kind  and  generous  nature  m'akes  her  a 
charming  person.  But  more  important  than  the  fact 
that  she  could  not  be  disciplined  is  the  lowering  of  en- 
ergy that  these  sicknesses  produced,  a  lowering  marked 
mainly  by  a  liability  to  fatigue  and  depression. 

Let  there  come  a  sickness,  and  this  woman's  stock  of 
hopeful  mood  goes  and  there  results  a  loss  of  interest 
in  life,  a  loss  of  zest  and  joyousness. 

A  digression,  —  and  a  return  to  the  theme  of  the  first 
chapter  of  this  book.  The  dependence  of  the  mental 
life  on  bodily  structure,  equally  true  in  both  the  sexes, 
is  exquisitely  demonstrated  in  woman.  In  many 
women  there  occurs  an  extraordinary  increase  of  sex 
desire  just  before  the  menstrual  period  and  in  some  to 
the  point  where  it  causes  great  internal  conflict.  Others 
show  moderate  depression  and  even  confusion  at  this 
time,  and  to  the  majority  of  women  some  mood  and 
thought  change  is  taken  for  granted.  At  the  menopause 
mental  difficulties  to  the  point  of  insanity  are  witnessed, 
and  in  some  cases  the  change  is  permanent.  Back  of 
mood  is  the  entire  organic  life  of  the  organism,  and  back 
of  the  nature  of  our  thoughts  and  deeds  is  mood. 

A  peculiarity  of  fatigue  is  remarkably  well  shown  by 
this  person.  When  she  is  tired  or  convalescent  a  de- 
pressing thought  sticks,  becomes  an  obsession,  a  fixed 
idea,  to  the  plague  of  her  life.  Thus  when  she  was  nurs- 
ing her  first  baby  the  night  feedings  exhausted  her. 
One  night,  half  asleep  and  half  awake,  with  the  vigorous 
little  animal  pulling  away  at  her  breast,  she  watched 
the  pulsing  fontanelle  on  the  top  of  the  baby's  head, 
and  the  thought  came  to  her  how  dreadfully  easy  it 


356  THE  FOUNDATIONS  OF  PERSONALITY 

would  be  to  injure  the  brain  beneath.  Her  heart 
pounced  in  fear,  she  almost  fainted  at  the  thought,  and 
yet  it  "  stuck  "  and  came  back  to  her  with  each  random 
association.  I  need  not  detail  how  the  idea  recurred 
a  dozen  times  a  day  and  brought  the  fear  that  she  was 
going  insane.  She  stopped  nursing  the  baby  at  night, 
got  a  good  rest,  and  the  idea  disappeared.  She  was 
"  able  to  shake  off  "  when  rested  that  which  was  a  hid- 
eous obsession  when  fatigued. 

Indeed,  one  might  speak  of  persons  of  this  type  as 
hypothymic  as  well  as  cyclothymic.  The  hypothymic 
are  those  whose  stock  of  courage  and  hope  is  easily  ex- 
hausted, who  become  easily  discouraged.  They  are 
borrowers  of  energy  and  vigor,  they  need  sturdier  folk 
around  them;  often  they  are  said  to  be  sensitive,  and 
while  this  is  sometimes  true,  it  is  more  often  the  case 
that  they  are  more  affected.  That  is,  two  persons  may 
notice  the  same  thing  or  suffer  the  same  sickness,  but 
the  so-called  sensitive  has  a  reserve  of  courage  and  en- 
ergy that  disappears,  whereas  the  other  has  enough  left 
in  stock  so  that  he  does  not  feel  any  change. 

The  extraordinary  complexity  of  human  character  is 
well  illustrated  by  C.  D.  She  is  hypothymic  or  cyclo- 
thymic to  the  little  affairs  of  life  and  to  the  minor  ill- 
nesses. Yet  when  her  family  fortunes  were  greatly  im- 
perilled by  a  financial  crisis,  she  stood  up  against  the 
strain  far  better  than  did  her  husband,  a  man  sturdy 
and  buoyant  in  most  of  the  affairs  of  life.  His  ego  was 
more  concerned  with  financial  fortune  than  was  hers, 
and  against  this  ill  she  was  the  philosopher  and  not  he. 

We  may  well  contrast  L.  D.  with  her  husband.  He 
belongs  to  the  sturdy  in  emotions  and  morals,  —  the 
stable.  Dark  days  and  bright  days,  sickness  and  health, 
fatigue  and  rest  seem  to  impair  his  courage,  hope  and 


SOME  CHARACTER  TYPES  357 

general  cheerfulness  of  mood  but  little.  He  has  a  high 
organic  balance  and  a  well-built-up  philosophy.  I 
started  to  say  of  him  that  he  is  an  optimist,  but  this  is 
not  true.  He  is  cheerful,  but  he  does  not  sing,  "  Tra 
la  la,  all  the  things  that  are,  are  good."  He  says, 
"  There  are  bad  things,  but  I  must  carry  on  and  fight 
the  good  fight."  His  is  a  philosophy  of  courage  and  en- 
durance, but  not  of  optimistic  twaddle.  He  is  too  wide- 
brained  to  speak  of  life  as  "  all  good  "  when  he  knows 
of  inherited  disease,  cruelty,  preventable  poverty,  gross 
neglect  and  unmerited  misfortune.  Yet  he  lends  hope 
and  comfort  to  the  afflicted,  and  he  has  an  unvarying 
comfort  for  his  cyclothymic  mate. 

He  has  built  up  his  ego  around  a  business,  one  in 
which  there  was  sunk  not  only  his  own  fortune  but  that 
of  a  host  of  friends.  When  this  was  so  threatened  as 
to  seem  inevitably  lost,  his  ego  was  deeply  wounded, 
he  lost  courage  and  hope  and  then  needed  the  strength 
of  his  wife.  This  she  gave,  and  when  the  tide  of  af- 
fairs turned,  his  own  courage  was  ready  and  unim- 
paired. We  are  like  trees,  —  the  hard,  strong,  knotty 
parts  of  our  fiber  are  distributed  in  irregular  fashion, 
and  he  who  seems  strongest  has  a  weak  place  some- 
where. Attack  that,  and  his  resistance,  courage  and 
hope  disappear. 

While  there  are  the  types  of  mood  and  emotional 
make-up,  there  are  curious  monothymic  types,  people 
who  habitually  tend  to  react  with  one  emotion  or  mood. 

The  fear  type.  It  must  again  be  emphasized  that  we 
cannot  separate  emotion,  mood,  instinct,  intelligence 
in  our  analysis.  And  so  we  shall  speak  of  individuals 
of  this  or  that  type  when  what  we  mean  is  that  they 
reacted  habitually  and  remarkably  in  one  direction. 
Thus  with  the  man  F.,  who  has  quick  imagination,  and 


358  THE  FOUNDATIONS  OF  PERSONALITY 

whose  ability  to  forecast  is  inextricably  mixed  with  a 
liability  to  fear.  It  is  true  that  some  do  not  fear  be- 
cause they  do  not  foresee,  and  that  placidity  and  calm- 
ness are  less  often  due  to  courage  than  to  lack  of  imagi- 
nation. 

F.  feared  animals  excessively  as  a  child  and  injury  to 
himself  as  a  boy,  so  that  he  played  few  rough  games. 
To  a  large  extent  his  parents  fostered  this  fear  in  him 
by  carefully  guarding  and  watching  him,  by  putting 
him  through  that  neurasthenic  regimen  so  brilliantly 
described  by  Arthur  Guiterman  in  his  story  of  the  asep- 
tic pup.  Yet  he  had  a  brother  as  carefully  brought  up 
as  himself  who  became  a  rough-and-tumble  lad,  with  as 
little  likelihood  to  fear  as  any  boy.  So  that  we  may 
only  assume  that  F.'s  training  fostered  fear  in  him ;  it 
did  not  cause  it. 

At  the  age  of  thirteen  the  fear  of  death  entered  F.'s 
life,  the  occasion  being  the  death  of  an  uncle.  The 
mourning,  the  quick  fleeting  sight  of  the  dead  man  in 
the  black  box,  the  interment  of  the  once  vigorous,  joy- 
ous man  in  the  earth  struck  terror  into  the  heart  of 
the  boy.  From  that  time  much  of  his  life  was  controlled 
by  his  struggles  with  the  fear  of  death,  and  his  history 
is  his  reaction  to  that  fear.  At  fourteen  he  astonished 
his  free-thinking  family  by  becoming  a  devout  Christian, 
by  praying,  attending  church  regularly  and  by  becoming 
so  moral  in  his  conduct  as  to  warrant  the  belief  that 
there  was  something  wrong  with  him.  Indeed,  had  a 
psychiatrist  examined  him  at  this  time,  there  is  no 
doubt  he  would  have  diagnosed  his  condition  as  a  begin- 
ning Dementia  Precox.  But  he  was  not;  he  simply 
was  compensating  for  his  fear  of  death. 

At  sixteen  he  entered  an  academy  where  he  was  forced 
to  go  into  athletics.    The  fear  of  injury  and  death 


SOME  CHARACTER  TYPES  359 

plagued  him  so  that  he  broke  down,  but  this  breakdown 
did  not  last  long,  and  he  reentered  athletics  and  did 
fairly  well.  Indeed,  in  order  to  break  himself  of  fear, 
he  became  outwardly  a  rather  daring  gymnast,  hoping 
that  what  he  had  so  often  read  of  the  sickly  and  puny 
becoming  strong  and  vigorous  through  training  would 
be  true  of  him.  As  soon  as  he  reached  a  stage  in  school 
where  compulsory  training  was  dropped,  he  discontin- 
ued athletics,  with  much  inward  relief.  In  fact, 
pride,  fear  of  being  considered  a  coward,  was  mainly 
responsible  for  his  efforts  in  this  direction. 

In  college  he  fell  under  the  influence  of  Omar  Khay- 
^m  and  the  epicurean  reaction  to  death.  He  feverishly 
entered  pleasure  and  swung  easily  from  religious  fer- 
vor to  a  complete  agnosticism.  He  became  a  first- 
nighter,  knew  all  the  chorus  girls  it  was  possible  for  him 
to  become  acquainted  with,  learned  to  drink  but  never 
learned  to  enjoy  it.  In  fact,  after  each  sensual  indul- 
gence his  reaction  against  himself  led  him  to  a  despair 
which  might  have  terminated  in  suicide  were  it  not  that 
he  feared  death  more  than  the  reproaches  of  his  con- 
science. Then  he  fell  under  the  influence  of  a  group 
of  men  and  women  in  his  college  town,  philanthropists 
and  social  reformers,  whose  enthusiasm  and  energy 
seemed  to  him  miraculous,  and  as  he  grew  to  know  them 
he  realized  with  a  something  like  ecstasy  and  yet  gov- 
erned by  intelligence,  that  in  such  work  was  a  compen- 
sation for  death  that  might  satisfy  both  his  emotions 
and  his  intelligence.  Again  to  the  surprise  of  his  par- 
ents, and  in  the  face  of  their  prediction  that  he  would 
soon  "  tire  "  of  this  fad,  he  entered  into  their  activities 
and  proved  himself  a  devoted  worker.  Too  devoted,  for 
now  and  then  he  needs  medical  attention,  and  it  was  in 
one  of  these  "  neurasthenic  "  periods  that  I  met  him. 


360  THE  FOUNDATIONS  OF  PERSONALITY 

I  learned  that  the  spur  that  kept  him  going,  that  made 
him  energetic,  was  the  fear  that  death  would  overtake 
him  before  he  achieved  anything  worth  while;  that  he 
hated  to  die  and  was  appalled  by  the  thought  of  death, 
but  that  he  could  forget  all  this  in  work  of  a  socially 
useful  kind. 

F.  might  almost  stand  for  mankind  in  his  reactions  to 
death.  He  seemed  to  me  almost  too  good  to  be  true  as 
a  demonstration  of  a  pet  thesis  of  mine,  namely,  that 
the  fear  of  death  is  behind  an  enormous  amount  of  men's 
deeds  and  beliefs.  His  reaction  was  of  the  compensa- 
tory type,  where  the  fear  arouses  counter-emotions, 
counter-activities.  F.'s  is  a  noble  response  to  fear,  just 
as  the  cowardly  reaction  is  the  ignoble  response, 

I  shall  not  depict  the  coward.  There  are  some  in 
whose  lives  the  fear  of  death,  injury,  illness  or  loss  is 
in  constant  operation  to  prevent  activity,  to  lower  en- 
ergy and  effort.  One  finds  the  coward  very  commonly 
in  the  clinics  for  nervous  diseases,  and  in  some  cases 
the  formidable  term  of  psychasthenia  is  merely  camou- 
flage for  the  more  direct  English  word.  There  is  a 
type  of  the  timid,  who  will  not  stand  up  for  their  rights, 
who  receive  meekly,  as  if  it  were  their  due,  the  buffets 
of  fortune.  This  type  is  well  exemplified  in  F.  B., 
who  passes  through  life  cheated  by  every  rogue  and 
walked  on  by  any  strong-willed  person  that  comes  along. 
As  a  boy  he  was  bullied  by  nearly  all  his  playmates,  did 
the  chores,  was  selected  for  the  "  booh  "  parts  in  games 
and  never  dared  resent  it,  though  he  was  fully  conscious 
that  he  was  being  put  upon.  When  he  went  to  work 
in  a  factory  he  was  the  one  selected  for  all  those  prac- 
tical jokes  in  which  minor  cruelty  manifests  itself.  His 
parents  also  bullied  him,  so  that  he  was  compelled  to 
turn  over  most  of  his  earnings  to  them  and  was  allowed 


SOME  CHARACTER  TYPES  361 

to  keep  so  little  that  he  was  shabby,  half-starved  and 
without  any  of  the  luxuries  for  which  even  his  timid 
soul  longed. 

F.  B.  was  mortally  afraid  of  girls ;  they  seemed  to  him 
to  be  terrible  and  beautiful  creatures,  very  scornful  and 
awe-inspiring.  They  made  him  feel  inferior  in  a  way 
that  sent  him  edging  from  their  presence,  and  though 
he  sometimes  surged  with  passion  he  avoided  any  con- 
tact with  them. 

As  a  good  workman  he  received  good  pay,  for  he 
chanced,  by  the  merest  luck,  to  fall  into  the  hands  of 
a  kind  employer,  who  profited  by  his  kindness,  for  F.  B. 
gave  more  than  a  dollar  of  value  for  each  dollar  he 
received.  Timid,  he  gave  to  the  employer  a  great  loy- 
alty, which  was  in  part  based  on  his  awe  of  any  aggres- 
sive personality. 

In  society  this  man  was  tongue-tied,  embarrassed  and 
overawed  by  the  well-dressed  and  prosperous-looking. 
His  sense  of  inferiority  was  in  no  way  compensated  for, 
and  to  avoid  pain  he  became  a  sort  of  recluse,  doing  his 
work  and  returning  to  his  shell,  so  to  speak,  each  night. 

When  he  was  thirty-six  his  mother  died,  his  father 
having  died  earlier.  This  left  him  rather  well  to  do,  for 
his  thrifty  parents  had  well  utilized  his  earnings.  At 
once  a  thoughtful  woman  of  his  acquaintance,  distantly 
related  by  marriage,  set  out  to  capture  him,  and  by  forc- 
ing the  issue  led  him  to  the  altar.  Needless  to  say,  she 
ruled  the  household,  and  F.  B.'s  only  consolation  lay  in 
the  crop  of  children  that  soon  appeared  in  the  house, 
for  timidity  is  no  barrier  to  parenthood.  This  consola- 
tion rather  tends  to  disappear  as  the  children  grow  older, 
for  they  become  his  masters.  Such  men  as  F.  B.  have 
a  collar  around  their  necks  to  which  any  one  may  fit 
a  chain. 


362  THE  FOUNDATIONS  OF  PERSONALITY 

Does  F.  B.  rejoice  in  inferiority,  in  the  masochistic 
sense  spoken  of  before?  Is  his  humility  a  sign  of  inver- 
sion, in  the  Freudian  sense,  a  sort  of  homosexuality? 
Possibly,  and  there  are  very  crude  and  coarse  phrases 
of  the  common  man  indicating  a  sexual  feeling  in  all 
victory  and  defeat.  But  I  am  inclined  to  call  this  a 
sort  of  monothymia,  a  mood  of  fear  and  negative  self- 
feeling  coloring  all  the  reactions. 

I  have  previously  cited  the  case  of  the  man  obsessed 
by  fear  in  all  the  relations  of  life,  —  shrinking,  self- 
acknowledged  inferiority  —  who  lost  it  with  "  a  few 
drinks  under  my  belt."  "  Dutch  courage  "  drove  from 
many  a  man  the  inferiority  and  the  fear  that  plagued 
his  soul.  True,  it  drove  him  into  a  worse  situation,  but 
for  a  few  moments  he  tasted  something  of  the  life  that 
heroes  and  the  great  have.  If  we  can  ever  find  some- 
thing that  will  not  degrade  as  it  exalts,  all  the  world 
will  rush  to  use  it. 

Of  the  monothymic  types  the  choleric  or  angry  are 
about  as  common  as  those  predisposed  to  fear.  The 
anger  emotion  is  aroused  by  a  thwarting  of  the  instincts 
and  purposes,  and  in  the  main  the  strongly  egoistic  are 
those  most  given  to  explosive  or  chronic  anger.  The 
angry  feeling,  however,  must  be  controlled,  else  failure 
or  social  dislike  awaits  the  choleric.  When  a  man  wins 
success  he  frequently  allows  himself  the  luxury  of  in- 
dulging his  anger  because  he  feels  his  power  cannot  be 
challenged.  The  Duchess  in  "  Alice's  Adventures  in 
Wonderland,"  with  her  choleric  "  off  with  his  head  " 
whenever  any  one  contradicted  her,  is  a  caricature,  and 
a  very  apt  one,  of  this  type  of  person.  We  think  of  the 
bull-necked  Henry  the  Eighth  —  "  bluff  King  Hal  "  — 
as  the  choleric  type,  though  here  we  also  assume  a  cer- 


SOME  CHARACTER  TYPES  363 

tain  cyclothymia,  great  good  nature  alternating  with 
fierce  anger. 

I  have  in  mind  G.  as  a  type  of  the  angry  person.  G. 
cannot  bear  to  have  any  one  contradict  him.  Either 
he  swallows  his  resentment,  if  he  is  in  the  presence  of 
one  he  cannot  afford  to  antagonize,  or  else  he  starts  to 
abuse  the  victim  verbally.  He  is  sarcastic  or  violent 
according  to  circumstances;  rarely  is  he  pleasant  in 
manner  or  speech.  Though  he  is  honest  and  said  to  be 
well-meaning,  his  ego  explodes  in  the  presence  of  other 
self-assertive  egos.  When  a  man  truckles  to  him  he  is 
angry  at  his  insincerity;  when  the  other  disputes  his 
statements,  or  even  offers  other  views,  he  finds  himself 
confronted  by  one  who  has  taken  deep  offense.  As  a 
result  G.  has  no  real  friends,  and  this  has  added  fuel  to 
his  anger.  Often  he  has  made  up  his  mind  to  "  control  " 
himself,  to  keep  down  his  scorn  and  rage,  but  rarely  has 
he  been  able  to  maintain  a  proper  attitude  for  any  length 
of  time. 

In  the  last  analysis  a  high  self-valuation  is  part  of 
the  chronic  choleric  make-up,  a  conceit  of  overweening 
proportions.  The  man  who  realizes  his  own  proneness 
to  err,  and  who  keeps  in  mind  the  relative  unimpor- 
tance of  his  aims  and  powers,  is  not  apt  to  explode  in 
the  face  of  opposition  or  contradiction.  G.  is  as  a  rule 
absolutely  sure  of  his  belief,  tastes  and  importance, 
though  he  is  crude  in  knowledge,  coarse  in  tastes  and 
of  no  particular  importance  except  to  himself.  He  is 
the  "  I  am  Sir  Oracle ;  when  I  ope  my  lips  let  no  dog 
bark." 

Anger  is  often  associated  with  brutality  or  deeds  of 
violence.  There  is  cold-blooded  brutality,  but  by  far 
the  most  of  it  has  anger  behind  it.  I  know  one  man 
who  in  his  youth  was  hot-tempered,  i.  e.,  quick  to  anger 


364  THE  FOUNDATIONS  OF  PERSONALITY 

and  quick  to  repent,  a  charming  man  who  gradually 
learned  control  and  passed  into  late  middle  life  serene 
and  amiable. 

One  day  he  was  driving  his  car  when  it  became  ob- 
structed by  two  young  rowdies  driving  another  car. 
With  him  was  his  wife.  When  he  expostulated  with  the 
men,  one  of  them  turned  with  a  sneer  and  said  some- 
thing insulting  at  which  the  other  laughed.  The  next 
thing  my  friend  knew  he  was  in  the  other  car,  striking 
heavy  blows  at  the  pair  (he  is  a  very  powerful  man), 
and  it  was  only  the  opportune  arrival  of  a  policeman 
that  prevented  a  murder. 

"  Whatever  came  over  me  I  hardly  understand,"  said 
he  afterwards  sadly.  "  I  used  to  have  rages  like  that 
as  a  boy,  but  I  have  been  vei'y  well  controlled  for  over 
thirty  years.  I  was  a  raging  demon  for  a  while,  and  it 
appalls  me  to  think  that  in  me  there  lurks  such  a  devil 
of  anger." 

Akin  to  anger,  akin  to  fear,  is  suspicion.  There  is  a 
sullen  non-social  personality  type  whose  reactions  are 
characterized  by  suspicion.  He  never  willingly  gives 
his  trust  to  any  one,  and  when  he  hands  over  his  des- 
tinies to  any  one,  as  all  must  do  now  and  then,  he  is 
consumed  with  dread,  doubt  and  latent  hostility. 

Every  one  is  familiar  with  men  like  H.  He  is  full 
of  distrust  for  his  fellow  men.  Himself  a  man  of  low 
ideals,  he  ascribes  to  every  one  the  same  attitude. 
"  What's  in  it  for  you?  "  is  his  first  thought  concerning 
anybody  with  whom  he  deals. 

He  has  a  little  store  and  eyes  each  customer  who 
comes  in  as  if  they  come  to  rob  him.  As  a  result  his 
trade  is  largely  emergency,  transient  trade,  those  who 
come  because  they  have  nowhere  else  to  go  or  else  do  not 
know  him.     The  salesmen,  who  supply  the  articles  he 


SOME  CHAKACTER  TYPES  365 

sells  have  long  since  cut  him  off  their  list  for  desirable 
goods,  and  his  only  callers  are  those  salesmen  who  are 
working  up  new  lines  and  are  under  orders  to  try  every 
one.  H.  has  moments  and  days  when  he  believes  the 
whole  world  is  against  him,  and  on  such  occasions  he 
locks  his  store  and  refuses  to  see  any  one.  But  at  his 
best  he  cannot  yield  his  ego  to  full  free  intercourse  with 
others.  It  seems  as  though  there  were  a  hard  shell 
surrounding  him,  and  the  world  as  it  flowed  around 
never  brought  love  and  trust  through  to  him. 

H.  is  not  insane  in  the  ordinary  sense,  but  he  is  one 
of  those  paranoid  persons  we  spoke  of  previously.  Turn 
to  L.,  a  true  case  of  mental  disease,  a  paranoid  whose 
career  strangely  resembles  some  of  the  great  historic 
paranoids,  for  it  must  be  remembered  that  man  has 
been  imposed  upon  by  those  who  deceived  themselves, 
who  fully  believed  the  strange  and  incredible  things 
they  succeeded  in  making  credible  to  others. 

The  fantastic  paranoid  is  made  up  of  the  same  ma- 
terials as  the  rest  of  us,  except  that  his  ego  feeling  is 
without  insight,  and  his  suspicion  grows  and  grows  un- 
til it  reaches  the  delusion  of  persecution.  L.  was  a 
bright  boy,  always  conceited  and  given  to  non-social 
acts.  Thus  he  never  would  play  with  the  other  boys 
unless  he  were  given  the  leading  r61e,  and  he  could  not 
bear  to  hear  others  praised  or  to  praise  them.  Paren- 
thetically the  r61e  that  jealousy  plays  in  the  conduct  of 
men  and  women  needs  exposition,  and  I  recommend 
that  some  Ph.  D.  merit  his  degree  by  a  thesis  on  this  sub- 
ject. When  he  was  a  little  older  he  got  the  notion  that 
hats  were  bad  for  the  hair,  and  being  proud  of  his  own 
thick  black  mop,  he  went  without  a  hat  for  over  a  year, 
despite  the  tears  and  protestations  of  his  family  and  the 


366  THE  FOUNDATIONS  OF  PERSONALITY 

ridicule  of  his  friends.  There  is  no  one  so  ready  to 
die  for  a  cause,  good  or  bad,  as  the  paranoid. 

He  entered  the  medical  school,  and  to  this  day  there 
is  none  of  his  classmates  who  has  forgotten  him.  Proud, 
even  haughty,  with  only  one  or  two  intimates,  he  studied 
hard  and  did  very  good  work.  Now  and  then  he  aston- 
ished the  class  by  taking  direct  issue  with  some  profes- 
sor, disputing  a  theory  or  a  fact  with  the  air  of  an  au- 
thority and  proposing  some  other  idea,  logically  devel- 
oped but  foolishly  based,  as  if  his  training  were  suflft- 
cient.  It  is  characteristic  of  all  paranoid  philosophy 
and  schemes  that  they  despise  real  experimentation, 
that  they  start  with  some  postulate  that  has  no  basis 
in  work  done  and  go  on  with  a  minute  hyper-logic  that 
deceives  the  unsophisticated. 

Though  L.  was  "  bright,"  there  were  better  men  in  his 
class,  and  they  received  the  honors.  L.  was  deeply  of- 
fended at  this  and  claimed  to  his  own  friends  that  the 
professors  were  down  on  him,  especially  a  certain  pro- 
fessor of  medicine,  who,  so  L.  intimated,  was  afraid 
that  L.'s  theories  would  displace  his  own  and  so  was 
interested  to  keep  him  down.  This  feeling  was  intensi- 
fied when  he  came  up  for  the  examinations  to  a  certain 
famous  hospital  and  was  turned  down.  The  real  reason 
for  this  failure  was  his  unpopularity  with  his  fellow 
students,  for  they  let  it  be  known  to  the  examiners  that 
L.  would  undoubtedly  be  hard  to  get  along  with,  and  it 
was  part  of  the  policy  of  the  hospital  to  consider  the 
personality  of  an  applicant  as  well  as  his  ability. 

L.  obtained  a  hospital  place  in  a  small  city  and  did 
very  good  work,  and  though  his  peculiarities  were  no- 
ticed they  excited  only  a  hidden  current  of  amused 
criticism,  while  his  abilities  aroused  a  good  deal  of 
praise.     Stimulated  by  this,  he  started  practice  in  the 


SOME  CHARACTER  TYPES  367 

same  city  as  a  surgeon  and  quickly  rose  to  the  leading 
position.  His  indefatigable  industry,  his  absolute  self- 
confidence  and  his  skill  gave  him  prestige  almost  at 
once.  His  conceit  rose  to  the  highest  degree,  and  his 
mannerisms  commenced  to  become  offensive  to  others. 
He  came  into  collision  with  the  local  medical  society 
because  he  openly  criticized  the  older  men  in  practice 
as  "  ignoramuses,  asses,  charlatans,  etc.,"  and  indeed 
was  sued  by  one  of  them  in  the  courts.  The  suit  was 
won  by  the  plaintiff,  the  award  was  five  thousand  dol- 
lars and  L.  entered  an  appeal. 

From  this  on  his  career  turned.  In  order  to  contest 
the  case,  and  because  he  began  to  believe  that  the  courts 
and  lawyers  were  in  league  against  him,  he  studied  law 
and  was  admitted  to  the  bar.  He  had  meanwhile  mar- 
ried a  rich  woman  who  was  wholly  taken  in  by  his  keen 
logical  exposition  of  his  "  wrongs,"  his  imposing  manner 
of  speech  and  action;  and  perhaps  she  really  fell  in 
love  with  the  able,  aggressive  and  handsome  man.  She 
financed  his  law  school  studies,  for  it  was  necessary  for 
him  to  give  up  most  of  his  practice  meanwhile. 

As  soon  as  he  could  appear  before  the  Bar  he  did  so  in 
his  own  behalf,  for  this  case  had  now  reached  the  pro- 
portions where  it  had  spread  out  into  half  a  dozen  cases. 
He  refused  to  pay  his  lawyers,  and  they  sued.  One  of 
them  dropped  the  statement  that  L.  was  "  crazy,"  and 
he  brought  a  suit  against  the  lawyer.  Moreover,  he 
began  to  believe,  because  of  the  adverse  judgments,  that 
the  courts  were  against  him,  and  he  wrote  article  after 
article  in  the  radical  journals  on  the  corruptness  of  the 
courts  and  entered  a  strenuous  campaign  to  provide  for 
the  public  election  and  recall  of  judges. 

These  activities  brought  him  in  close  relations  with 
a  group  of  unbalanced  people  operating  under  the  high- 


368  THE  FOUNDATIONS  OF  PERSONALITY 

sounding  name  League  of  Freedom.  These  people,  led 
by  a  man,  J.,  eagerly  welcomed  L,,  largely  because  his 
wife  was  still  financing  his  ventures.  Here  comes  a 
curious  fact,  and  one  prominent  in  the  history  of  man, 
for  this  group,  led  by  two  unbalanced  men,  actually 
engineered  a  real  reform,  for  they  brought  about  a  codi- 
fication of  the  laws  of  their  State,  a  simple  codification 
that  made  it  possible  to  know  what  the  laws  on  any 
matter  really  are.  This  may  be  stated:  the  average 
balanced  person  is  apt  to  weigh  consequences  to  him- 
self, but  the  paranoid  does  not;  and  so,  when  accident 
or  circumstances  ^  enlist  him  in  a  good  cause,  he  is  a 
fighter  without  fear  and  is  enormously  valuable. 

This  success  brought  L.'s  paranoia  to  the  pinnacle  of 
unreason.  He  attacked  the  courts  boldly,  openly  and 
publicly  accused  the  judges  of  corruption,  said  they  were 
in  conspiracy  with  the  Bar  and  the  medical  societies 
to  do  him  up,  added  to  this  list  of  his  enemies  the  Irish 
and  the  Catholic  Church,  because  the  prosecuting  attor- 
ney in  one  county  and  the  judge  in  that  court  were 
Irish  and  Catholic,  and  then  turned  against  his  wife  be- 
cause she  now  began  to  doubt  his  sanity.  He  brought 
suits  in  every  superior  court  in  the  State,  and  at  the 
time  he  was  committed  to  an  Insane  Hospital  he  had 
forty  trials  on,  had  innumerable  manuscripts  of  his 
contemplated  reforms,  in  which  were  included  the  doing 
away  with  Insane  Hospitals,  the  examination  of  all  per- 
sons in  the  State  for  venereal  disease  and  their  cure  by 
a  new  remedy  of  his  own,  the  reform  of  the  judiciary, 
etc.,  etc.  He  accused  his  wife  of  infidelity,  felt  that  he 
was  being  followed  by  spies  and  police,  claimed  that  dic- 
tagraphs were  installed  everywhere  to  spy  on  him  and 
had  a  classical  delusional  state.     He  was  committed, 

*  See  LombroBo's  "  Man  of  Genius  "  for  many  such  cases. 


SOME  CHARACTER  TYPES  369 

but  later  he  escaped  from  the  hospital  and  is  now  at 
large.  The  State  officials  are  making  no  effort  to  find 
him,  mainly  because  they  are  glad  to  get  rid  of  him. 

While  the  cases  like  L.  are  not  common,  the  "  mildly  " 
paranoid  personality  is  common.  Everywhere  one  finds 
the  man  or  woman  whose  abilities  are  not  recognized, 
who  is  discriminated  against,  who  finds  an  enemy  in 
every  one  who  does  not  kotow  and  who  interprets  as 
hostile  every  action  not  directly  conciliating  or  friendly. 
In  every  group  of  people  there  is  one  whose  paranoid 
temperament  must  be  reckoned  with,  who  is  distrustful, 
conceited  and  disruptive.  Often  they  are  high-minded, 
perhaps  devoted  to  an  ideal,  and  if  they  convince  others 
of  their  wrongs  they  increase  the  social  disharmonies 
by  creating  new  social  wars,  large  or  small  according 
to  their  influence,  intelligence  and  other  circumstances. 

The  type  of  the  trusting  need  not  be  here  illustrated 
by  any  case  history.  Dickens  has  given  us  an  immortal 
figure  in  the  genial,  generous  and  impulsive  Mr.  Pick- 
wick, and  Cervantes  satirized  knighthood  by  depicting 
the  trusting,  credulous  Don  Quixote.  We  laugh  at 
these  figures,  but  we  love  them;  they  preserve  for  us 
the  sweetnesS'  of  childhood  and  hurt  only  themselves 
and  their  own.  Trust  in  one's  fellows  is  not  common, 
because  the  world  is  organized  on  egoism  more  than  on 
fellowship.  Where  fellowship  becomes  a  code,  as  in 
the  relations  of  men  associated  together  for  some  great 
purpose,  then  a  noble  trust  appears. 

So  I  pass  over  those  whose  mood  runs  all  one  way  — 
the  hopeful,  the  despondent,  the  pessimist  and  the  op- 
timist—  to  other  types.  We  shall  then  consider  the 
two  great  directions  of  interest,  introspection  and  extro- 
spection,  and  those  whose  lives  are  characterized  by  one 
or  the  other  direction. 


370  THE  FOUNDATIONS  OF  PERSONALITY 

1.  The  introspective  personality  is  no  more  of  a  unit 
than  any  other  type.  Intelligence,  energy  and  a  host 
of  other  matters  play  their  part  in  the  sum  total  of  the 
character  here  as  elsewhere. 

H.  I.  is  what  might  be  called  the  intellectual  intro- 
spective personality.  From  the  very  earliest  days  he 
became  interested  in  himself  as  a  thinker.  "  How  do 
my  words  mean  anything?  "  he  asked  of  his  perplexed 
father  at  the  investigative  age  of  five.  "  Where  do  my 
thoughts  go  to  when  I  do  not  think  them?  "  was  the 
problem  he  floored  a  learned  uncle  with  a  year  later. 
This  type  of  curiosity  is  not  uncommon  in  children ;  in 
fact,  it  is  the  conventionality  and  laziness  of  the  elders 
that  stops  children  in  their  study  of  the  fundamentals. 
H.  was  not  stopped,  for  the  zeal  of  his  interest  was 
heightened  as  time  went  on. 

He  played  with  other  boys  but  early  found  their  con- 
clusions and  discussions  primitive.  He  became  an  ar- 
dent bookworm,  reading  incessantly  or  rather  at  such 
times  when  his  parents  permitted,  for  they  were  simple 
folk  who  were  rather  alarmed  at  their  boy's  interests 
and  zeal.  No  noticeable  difference  from  other  boys  was 
noted  aside  from  precocity  in  study,  yet  even  at  the 
age  of  ten  life  was  running  in  two  great  currents  for 
this  boy.  The  one  current  was  the  outer  world  with 
its  ever  varied  happenings,  the  other  was  the  inner 
world  of  thoughts  and  moods,  deeply,  fascinatingly  in- 
teresting. It  seemed  to  H.  I.  that  there  were  "  two  I's, 
one  of  which  sat  just  over  my  head  and  looking  down 
on  the  other  I,  watching  its  strivings,  its  emotions,  its 
thoughts  with  a  detached  and  yet  palpitating  interest. 
When  I  watched  the  other  boys  at  play  I  wondered 
whether  they  too  had  this  dual  existence,  whether  they 
chewed  the  cud  of  life  over  and  over  again  as  I  did." 


SOME  CHARACTER  TYPES  371 

Came  puberty  with  the  great  sex  passions.  The  vi- 
brating life  within  him  suddenly  became  tinged  with 
new  interests.  One  day  at  a  party  a  vixen  of  a  girl 
threw  herself  boldly  in  his  arms  and  tried  to  push  him 
into  a  chair.  The  bodily  contact  and  the  swift  bodily 
reaction  threw  him  into  a  panic,  for  the  passion  that 
was  aroused  was  so  powerful  that  he  seemed  to  himself 
stripped  of  all  thought  and  reflection  and  impelled  to 
actions  against  which  he  rebelled.  For  he  was  fully 
acquainted,  at  second  hand,  with  sex ;  he  knew  boys  and 
girls  who  had  made  excursions  into  its  most  intimate 
practices  and  despised  them. 

This  episode  gave  his  introspective  trends  a  new  direc- 
tion. From  now  on  sex  was  the  theme  his  fancy  em- 
broidered. Curiously  enough,  he  became  more  austere 
than  ever,  shunned  girls  and  especially  the  heroine  of 
his  adventure,  and  even  avoided  the  company  of  boys 
who  spoke  habitually  and  "  vulgarly  '^  of  sex.  His 
mind  built  up  sex  phantasies,  sex  adventures  in  which 
he  was  the  hero  and  in  which  girls  he  knew  and  those 
he  imagined  were  the  heroines,  but  at  the  same  time, 
standing  aloof  as  it  were,  another  part  of  him  seemed 
to  watch  his  own  reactions  until  "  I  nearly  went  crazy." 
He  became  obsessed  by  a  feeling  of  unreality  and 
adopted  a  Berkleyan  philosophy  of  idealism:  nothing 
seemed  to  exist  except  his  own  consciousness,  and  that 
seemed  of  doubtful  existence.  He  took  long  walks  by 
himself,  read  philosophy  and  science  with  avidity,  yet 
turned  by  preference  to  these  dreams  of  sex  adventure, 
palpitating,  alluring,  and  yet  so  unreal  to  his  critical 
self.  To  others  he  was  merely  a  bit  moody  and  de- 
tached, though  friendly  and  kind. 

He  went  to  college,  and  his  interest  in  sex  became 
secondary  almost  immediately.     His  student  days  were 


372  THE  FOUNDATIONS  OF  PERSONALITY 

passed  at  Harvard  at  a  time  when  Royce,  Palmer,  Santa- 
yanna,  and  James  ruled  in  its  philosophy,  and  H.  I. 
became  fascinated  by  these  men  and  their  subject.  His 
mind  was  again  drawn  into  introspection,  but  in  an 
organized  manner.  He  asked  himself  continually, 
"  What  are  the  purposes  of  life ;  why  do  we  love ;  does 
man  will  or  is  he  an  automaton  who  watches  the  hands 
go  around  and  thinks  he  moves  them?  "  Where  before 
his  feeling  of  unreality  was  largely  emotional,  now  it 
received  an  intellectual  sanction,  and  he  swung  from 
hither  to  yon  in  a  never-ending  cycle.  He  became 
wearied  beyond  measure  by  his  thoughts;  he  envied  the 
beasts  of  the  field,  the  laborer  in  the  ditch  and  all  to 
whom  life  and  living  were  realities  not  in  the  least  to  be 
examined  and  questioned.  Deliberately  he  decided  to 
shift  his  interests,  —  to  buy  an  automobile  and  learn 
about  it ;  to  play  cards ;  to  have  his  love  affair ;  to  taste 
emotion  and  pleasure  and  to  seek  no  intellectual  sanc- 
tion for  them. 

He  disappeared  from  college  for  a  year  and  came  back 
tanned,  ruddy  and  at  rest.  He  had  found  a  capacity 
for  interest  and  emotion  outside  of  himself.  He  had 
experienced  phases  of  life  about  which  he  would  not  talk 
at  first,  but  in  later  years  he  admitted  that  he  had  been 
a  "  man  of  the  w^orld."  He  regretted  much  that  had 
happened,  but  on  the  whole  he  rejoiced  in  an  equanimity, 
in  a  capacity  for  objective  interest,  that  he  had  never 
had  before.  His  introspective  trend  was  still  very 
strong,  but  it  lent  subtlety  and  wisdom  to  his  life, 
rather  than  weakness.  Now  and  then  he  became  har- 
assed by  a  feeling  of  unreality,  by  a  questioning  skep- 
ticism that  nullified  happiness,  and  he  felt  himself 
divided  by  his  intellect.  These  he  shook  off  by  dropping 
his  work,  by  hunting,  fishing  and  accepting  simple  goals 


SOME  CHARACTER  TYPES  373 

of  activity.  Later  on  he  married,  and  became  a  scholar 
of  some  note.  I  think  he  now  relishes  life  as  well  as  any 
really  thoughtful  man  of  middle  life  can. 

There  is  a  personality  type,  the  emotional  introspec- 
tive, whose  interest  in  life  is  directed  toward  their  own 
sensations  and  emotions.  They  do  not  view  people  or 
things  as  having  a  value  in  themselves  and  for  them- 
selves ;  they  deliberately  view  them  as  sources  of  a  per- 
sonal pleasurable  sensation.  I  do  not  mean  the  crude 
egoist  who  asks  of  anything  or  anybody,  "  What  good  is 
it  (or  he)  for  me?"  but  I  mean  that  connoisseur  in 
emotions,  casually  blase  and  bored,  who  seeks  new  sen- 
sations. This  is  an  introspective  deviation  of  a  serious 
kind,  for  the  connoisseur  in  emotions  rarely  is  happy 
and  usually  is  most  deeply  miserable.  Bourget  in  his 
remarkable  psychological  novel,  "A  Love  Crime,"  has 
admirably  drawn  one  of  these  characters.  The  exquisite 
Armand,  seeking  pleasure  constantly,  is  divided  into  the 
sensualist  who  seduces  and  ruins  and  the  introspection- 
ist  who  watches  the  proceeding  with  disgust  and  disillu- 
sion. It  is  not  an  outraged  conscience  that  is  at  work 
but  the  inability  to  feel  without  analyzing  the  feeling 
"Ah,  for  a  single  passion  that  might  apply  my  entire 
sensibility  to  another  being,  like  wet  paper  against  a 
window  pane."  This  is  the  eternal  tragedy  of  sophisti- 
cation, —  that  there  results  an  anhedonia  in  large  part 
manifested  by  a  restless  introspection.  The  mind  is 
drawn  away  from  the  outside  world,  and  everything  is 
seen  out  of  proportion. 

The  hypochondriac  directs  his  attention  to  his  health 
and  is  in  part  a  monothymic  of  the  fear  type.  Moliere's 
"  Le  Malade  Imaginaire  "  is  a  classical  study  of  this 
person,  and  I  do  not  presume  to  better  it.  Modern  popu- 
larizing of  disease  has  distinctly  increased  the  numbers 


374  THE  FOUNDATIONS  OF  PERSONALITY 

of  the  hypochondriacs,  or  at  any  rate  has  made  their 
fears  more  scientific.  Brain  tumor,  gastric  ulcer,  ap- 
pendicitis, tuberculosis,  heart  disease,  cancer,  syphilis, 
—  often  have  I  seen  a  hypochondriac  run  the  gamut  of 
all  these  deadly  diseases  and  still  retain  his  health.  The 
faddy  habits  they  form  are  the  sustenance  of  those  who 
start  the  varied  forms  of  vegetarianism,  chewing  cults, 
fresh-air  fiends,  wet-grass  fanatics,  back-to-nature  soci- 
eties, and  the  mild  lunacies  of  our  (and  every)  age. 

One  such  hypochondriac,  J.,  after  suffering  from  every 
disease  in  the  advertising  pages  of  the  daily  newspapers, 
developed  a  system  of  habits  that  finally  became  a  dis- 
ease in  itself.  He  rose  at  6.30  each  morning,  stood  naked 
in  the  middle  of  the  room,  took  six  deep  breaths,  rolled 
around  on  the  floor  and  kicked  his  arms  and  legs  about 
for  fifteen  minutes,  took  a  drink  of  cold  water,  had  a 
shower  bath  and  a  rub-down,  shaved,  attended  to  "  cer- 
tain bodily  functions  "  (his  term,  not  mine),  ate  a  break- 
fast consisting  of  gluten  bread,  two  slices,  one  and  one- 
half  glasses  of  milk,  a  soft-boiled  egg  (three  and  one-half 
minutes)  and  an  orange ;  walked  to  work,  taking  exactly 
twenty  minutes  to  do  it ;  opened  the  windows  wide  in  his 
ofBce  (fighting  with  the  other  clerks  who  preferred  com- 
fort to  fresh  air),  ate  a  health  luncheon  at  noon  con- 
sisting of  Postum,  nuts,  health  bread,  and  two  squares 
of  milk  chocolate;  walked  home  at  six,  taking  exactly 
20  minutes  to  do  it;  washed,  lay  on  the  couch  fifteen 
minutes  with  mind  fixed  on  infinity  (a  Hindoo  trick,  so 
he  heard),  ate  dinner,  which  never  varied  much  from 
rice,  cream,  potatoes,  milk  and,  heritage  of  saner  days, 
a  small  piece  of  pie !  All  the  day  he  watched  each  pain 
and  ache,  noted  whether  he  belched  or  spit  more  than 
usual,  and  at  night  went  to  sleep  at  10.30.  Needless  to 
say  he  had  no  friends,  was  known  as  "  that  nut "  and 


SOME  CHARACTER  TYPES  375 

really  broke  down  from  too  arduous  an  introspective 
existence. 

The  term  self-denial  has  been  used  from  earliest  times 
to  indicate  what  we  have  called  inhibition.  But  self- 
denial  is  fundamentally  a  wrong  term,  since  it  implies 
that  the  self  is  that  which  lusts  and  shirks,  and  that 
which  controls  desire  and  holds  the  individual  to  a  con- 
sistent and  ethical  line  of  conduct  is  not  the  self.  In 
fact,  the  self  is  based  on  inhibition  and  control,  and 
when  there  is  failure  in  these  regards  there  is  self- 
failure. 

Interesting  is  the  under-inhibited  person.  I  mean  by 
this  term  the  one  who  consistently  and  in  most  rela- 
tionship shows  an  inability  to  control  the  primitive 
instincts,  impulses  and  desires.  J.  F.  may  stand  as  a 
type  that  becomes  the  "  black  sheep  "  and  in  many  cases 
the  "  criminal."  He  comes  of  what  is  known  as  a  "  good 
family,"  which  in  his  case  means  that  the  parents  are 
well-to-do,  of  good  reputation  and  rather  above  the 
average  in  intelligence.  The  brothers  and  sisters  have 
all  done  well,  are  settled  in  their  ways  and  are  not  to 
be  distinguished  from  the  people  of  their  social  set  in 
manners  or  morals. 

It  was  impossible  to  discipline  J.  As  a  very  young 
child  he  resisted  his  mother's  efforts  to  train  him  into 
tidiness  or  restraint.  He  stole  whatever  he  desired, 
and  though  he  was  alternately  punished  and  pleaded 
with,  though  he  seemed  to  desire  to  please  his  parents, 
he  continued  to  steal  whenever  there  was  opportunity. 
At  six  he  entered  a  neighbor's  house,  and  while  there 
took  a  purse  that  was  lying  on  a  table,  rifled  it  of  its 
contents  and  disappeared  for  nearly  a  day,  when  he  was 
found  in  a  down-town  district,  having  gorged  himself 
with  candy  and  cake.     From  then  on  his  peculations 


376  THE  FOUNDATIONS  OF  PERSONALITY 

increased,  and  his  conduct  became  the  scandal  of  his 
family,  for  he  stole  even  from  the  maids  employed  in 
the  house,  as  well  as  from  guests.  In  each  case  the 
stealing  was  apparently  motivated  to  give  a  good  time  to 
himself  and  also  to  certain  chums  he  made  here  and 
there  in  the  city.  He  would  lie  to  evade  punishment, 
but  finally  would  yield,  confess  his  guilt,  express  deep- 
est repentance  and  accept  his  punishment  with  the  sin- 
cerity of  one  fully  conscious  of  deserving  it. 

In  school  he  did  poorly.  He  was  bright  enough.  In 
fact,  he  was  somewhat  above  the  average  in  memory  and 
comprehension  and  may  be  described  as  keen,  but  it  was 
dififtcult  for  him  to  keep  his  attention  consistently  on 
any  subject,  and  the  discipline  of  school  irked  him. 
He  ran  away  several  times  to  avoid  school,  and  each 
time,  until  he  was  about  fourteen,  came  back  after  a 
few  days,  —  bedraggled,  hungry  and  repentant.  The 
freedom  of  the  streets  appealed  to  him  as  offering  a  life 
varied  enough  to  suit  his  nature,  and  with  excitement 
and  adventure  always  in  the  air.  So  he  mingled  with 
all  kinds  of  boys  and  men  and  at  the  age  of  fourteen 
shocked  his  parents  by  being  arrested  as  one  of  a  gang 
that  was  engaged  in  robbing  drunken  men  in  the  slum 
quarters  of  the  city.  It  took  all  kinds  of  influence  to 
get  him  released  on  probation,  but  this  was  accom- 
plished and  then  the  boy  disappeared  from  home. 

He  was  gone  three  years  and  despite  all  search  had 
completely  disappeared.  His  people  had  given  up  all 
hope  of  seeing  him  again  (although  certain  members  of 
his  family  were  not  at  all  saddened  by  the  prospect) 
when  they  received  a  communication  from  the  police 
of  a  distant  city  with  a  photograph  of  the  boy,  asking 
if  it  was  true  that  he  was  their  son.  It  seems  that  J. 
had  drifted  from  place  to  place,  now  working  as  news- 


SOME  CHARACTER  TYPES  377 

boy,  stable  hand,  errand  boy,  messenger,  theater-usher, 
until  he  had  reached  this  city.  There  he  was  wander- 
ing on  the  streets,  hungry  and  ragged,  when  a  philan- 
thropic old  gentleman  noticed  him.  J.  has  the  good 
fortune  to  be  very  innocent  looking,  and  no  matter  what 
his  crimes,  his  face  might  belong  to  a  cherub.  A  friend 
once  stated  that  if  J.  appeared  at  Heaven's  gate,  St. 
Peter  would  surely  take  him  to  be  an  angel  come  back 
from  a  stroll  and  let  him  in.  The  philanthropist  stopped 
the  boy  and  inquired  into  his  history.  J.  told  him  a 
very  affecting  story  of  being  an  orphan  whom  a  cruel 
guardian  had  robbed  of  his  heritage  and  exaggerated 
his  sufferings  until  the  indignant  old  fellow  threatened 
to  have  the  police  prosecute  his  betrayer.  With  a  show 
of  great  magnanimity,  J.  refused  to  disclose  his  real 
name,  and  the  philanthropist  took  him  home.  He  had 
him  clothed  and  fed,  and  then,  taken  by  the  boy's  en- 
gaging mannere  and  bright  ways,  decided  to  educate 
and  adopt  him.  He  was  dissuaded  from  the  latter  by 
a  friend,  but  he  sent  J.  to  a  private  school  of  good  grade. 
To  the  surprise  of  the  old  man,  J.  was  continually  get- 
ting into  mischief,  and  finally  he  was  accused  of  steal- 
ing. Unable  to  believe  the  school  authorities,  the  old 
gentleman  took  the  boy  home  and  quizzed  him.  He  gave 
an  unsatisfactory  account  of  himself  and  that  night 
disappeared  with  a  considerable  sum  of  money.  The 
police  were  notified,  and  a  week  later  he  was  found  in  a 
house  of  the  type  —  so  euphemistically  called  —  of  "  ill 
fame."  There  he  was  spending  the  money  lavishly  on 
the  inmates  and  was  indulging  his  every  desire.  One 
of  the  women,  a  police  stool-pigeon,  identified  him  as 
the  boy  who  was  wanted  by  the  law,  and  he  was  ar- 
rested. 

Despite  the  efforts  of  the  parents  and  the  philan- 


378  THE  FOUNDATIONS  OF  PERSONALITY 

thropist,  the  boy  was  given  a  prison  sentence  and  is  still 
serving  it.  Characteristic  of  this  group  of  personalities 
are  these  traits:  (1)  an  impatience  with  the  arduous, 
an  incapacity  or  unwillingness  to  wait  for  results  in 
the  ordinary  way;  (2)  a  decided  dread  of  monotony,  a 
longing  for  excitement;  (3)  an  inability  to  form  per- 
manent purposes  and  to  inhibit  the  distracting  desires ; 
(4)  a  desire  to  win  others'  good  opinion  and  sympa- 
thy, —  therefore  he  always  lavished  his  money  on  those 
whom  that  kind  of  "  good  fellowship  "  wins  and  told 
pathetic  stories  to  those  whose  sentimentality  made 
them  easy  victims;  (5)  a  weak  kind  of  egoism,  seeking 
easy  ways  to  pleasure  and  position,  restless  under  dis- 
cipline, always  repentant  after  wrong-doing,  fluent  in 
speech  but  lacking  the  courage  to  face  the  difficulties 
of  life. 

This  under-inhibited  type  may  suddenly  reform  and 
apparently  entirely  emerge  from  difficulties.  I  have  in 
mind  a  conspicuous  case,  a  young  woman  now  happily 
married  and  the  mother  of  fine  children.  When  she 
was  thirteen  or  fourteen  the  petty  pilferings  of  her  child- 
hood took  on  a  serious  character.  She  began  to  steal 
from  the  person  of  strangers  and  from  the  homes  of 
friends.  She  romanced  in  the  most  convincing  fashion, 
told  strangers  the  most  remarkable  stories,  usually  of 
such  a  nature  as  to  make  her  interesting  and  an  object 
of  sympathy,  but  which  tended  to  blacken  the  reputation 
of  her  family.  She  lost  place  after  place  at  work,  was 
sent  to  a  hospital  to  become  a  nurse  and  demoralized 
hep  associates  by  her  lies  and  her  thefts.  She  was  a 
very  sweet  girl  in  every  other  way,  kindly,  generous, 
self-sacrificing,  studious  even,  and  her  character-contra- 
diction made  people  reluctant  to  believe  she  was  not 
Insane.     She  was  discharged  from  the  hospital,  stayed 


SOME  CHARACTER  TYPES  379 

at  home  for  a  few  months,  —  and  then  came  the  miracle. 

She  obtained  a  place  in  a  large  business  house  and 
worked  there  for  seven  years  or  up  till  the  time  of  her 
marriage.  She  was  steadily  promoted  and  was  ac- 
counted the  most  reliable  and  honest  employee  of  the 
establishment.  She  handled  money  and  goods,  was 
absolutely  truthful  and  her  earnest  efficiency  was  note- 
worthy. Her  private  life  was  in  complete  harmony  with 
this  business  career.  She  helped  her  parents,  who  are 
poor,  dressed  modestly,  studied  nights  and  yet  showed 
the  same  fondness  for  dancing  and  good  times  that  the 
normal  girl  does.  She  met  a  promising  young  business 
man  who  fell  immediately  in  love  with  this  demure  look- 
ing young  woman,  and  they  were  later  married. 

Once  I  asked  her  how  the  reform  came  about.  "  I 
don't  know  myself,"  she  answered  frankly.  "  I  never 
was  happy  —  when  I  was  the  other  way.  I  always 
vowed  reform,  but  when  there  was  money  around  I'd 
think  and  think  about  it  until  it  was  mine.  Then  I'd 
spend  it  in  a  silly  way  to  get  rid  of  it  fast.  I  craved 
good  things,  and  you  know  how  poor  we  were.  Then  I 
lied  just  to  have  people  like  me  and  pity  me,  even  though 
I  called  myself  a  fool  while  doing  it.  Often,  often  I 
tried  to  reform  and  for  a  week  or  two  would  be  real 
good.  Then  perhaps  I'd  see  some  money,  and  I'd  try 
to  think  of  something  else.  But  that  money  would  come 
to  my  mind,  and  I'd  get  hot  and  dizzy  thinking  about 
it.  Perhaps  I'd  say,  '  I'll  just  look  at  it,'  and  finally 
I'd  go  and  take  it  —  and  feel  so  relieved  and  spend  it. 
After  I  left  the  hospital  it  seemed  to  me  that  I  could 
never  smile  again.  I  cried  all  night  long;  I  wanted  to 
die.  I  could  see  one  girl  who  thought  I  was  so  good 
and  nice,  and  her  face  as  she  looked  at  me  when  I  left ! 
Her  eyes  were  wide  open,  and  her  mouth  was  so  stem, 


380  THE  FOUNDATIONS  OF  PERSONALITY 

and  she  looked  as  if  she  wanted  to  speak  but  she  turned 
around  and  walked  away.  One  day  I  woke  up  after  a 
restless  night  at  home,  and  it  seemed  to  me  that  I  had 
strength,  that  something  had  turned  around  in  my 
nature,  and  since  that  day  I  have  never  even  wanted 
to  steal.  I  haven't  had  to  try  to  be  good;  it  came  as 
natural  as  eating  and  sleeping." 

The  sexually  under-inhibited  are  those  whose  sex  con- 
trol is  deficient.  This  may  be  either  from  over-passion- 
ate nature,  bad  example,  deficient  mentality,  vanity  and 
desire  for  good  times,  as  in  certain  girls,  etc.  To  dis- 
cuss these  types  would  be  to  write  another  book,  and 
so  I  forbear.  But  this  I  wish  to  emphasize :  that  neither 
age,  sex  protestation  of  indifference  and  control,  occu- 
pation or  social  status,  alters  the  fact  that  the  history 
of  the  sex  feelings,  impulses  and  struggles  is  essential 
to  a  knowledge  of  character.  Without  detailing  sex 
types,  these  are  some  that  are  important. 

1.  The  uninhibited  impulsive,  passionate  (the  bulk  of 
the  prostitutes). 

2.  The  controlled,  passionate.    Very  common. 

3.  The  frigid.    Not  so  rare  as  believed. 

4.  The  extremely  passionate  (nymphomania,  satyri- 
asis) .    Rare.    Always  in  trouble. 

5.  The  sensualist,  a  deliberate  seeker  of  sex  pleasure, 
often  indulging  in  perversion.     Common  type. 

6.  The  perverted  types,  —  autoerotic  (masturbator), 
homosexual,  masochists,  sadists,  fetishist,  etc.  More 
common  than  the  ordinary  person  dreams. 

7.  The  periodic,  to  whom  sex  life  is  incidental  to  cer- 
tain periods  and  situations.  Common  among  women, 
less  common  among  men. 

8.  The  sublimators,  whose  sexual  activity  has  some- 
how been  harnessed  to  other  great  activities.     Fairly 


SOME  CHARACTER  TYPES  381 

frequent  among  those  who  either  through  choice  or 
necessity  are  to  remain  continent. 

9.  The  anhedonic  or  exhausted.  Found  in  the  sen- 
sualists and  often  reacted  to  by  the  formation  of  reli- 
gious and  ethical  codes,  which  eliminate  sex,  —  Tolstoy, 
the  hermits,  certain  Russian  sects,  etc. 

There  is  under-inhibition  of  a  good  kind.  There  are 
generous-hearted  people  always  ready  to  give  of  them- 
selves to  anything  or  anybody  that  needs  help.  Often 
"  fooled "  by  the  unworthy,  they  resolve  to  be  calm, 
judicial  and  selfish,  and  then,  —  their  generous  social 
natures  over-ride  caution,  and  again  they  plunge  into 
kindness  and  philanthropy. 

F.  L.  is  one  of  these.  As  child,  boy  and  young  man 
he  was  free-hearted  to  an  extraordinary  degree.  Raga- 
muffin, stray  dog  or  cat,  tramp,  down  and  outer  of  every 
kind  or  description,  these  enlisted  his  sympathy  and 
help  despite  the  expostulation  and  remonstrance  of  a 
series  of  conventional  good  people,  his  mother  and  father, 
his  best  friends  and  his  outraged  wife.  The  latter  never 
knew,  she  used  to  say,  what  he  would  bring  home  for 
dinner.  "He  always  forgot  to  bring  home  the  steak, 
but  he  never  forgot  to  lug  along  some  derelict."  More 
than  once  he  was  robbed,  often  he  was  imposed  upon. 
Once  he  met  an  interesting  vagabond  who  spoke  several 
languages,  quoted  the  Bible  with  ease  and  accuracy,  and 
so  fired  the  heart  of  our  simple  man  that  he  bought  him 
clothes  and  brought  him  home  to  stay.  His  wife  threw 
up  her  hands  in  despair.  "  But,  my  dear,"  said  F.  L., 
"  he's  a  scholar  who  has  fallen  on  evil  days."  "  Ah,^' 
she  answered,  "  I  fear  it  will  be  an  evil  day  for  us  when 
you  took  him  home."  She  had  a  good  chance  to  say, 
"  I  told  you  so,"  when  the  rogue  eloped  with  the  best 
of  their  silver. 


382  THE  FOUNDATIONS  OF  PERSONALITY 

Not  only  is  F.  L.  impulsive  and  uninhibited  in  his 
generosity,  but  his  "  pitch  in  and  help  "  quality  is  about 
as  well  manifested  in  other  matters.  If  he  sees  a  man 
or  boy  struggling  with  a  load,  he  immediately  forgets 
that  he  is  over  fifty  and  well  dressed  and  steps  right  in 
to  help.  He  saw  an  ash  and  garbage  man  —  this  is  his 
wife's  star  story  —  struggling  to  lift  a  much  befouled 
can  into  his  wagon.  F.  L.  left  his  wife  and  some  friends 
without  a  word  and  with  a  cheery  word  threw  the  can 
into  the  wagon.  Unfortunately  some  of  the  contents 
splashed,  and  F.  L.  suffered  both  in  dignity  and  ap- 
pearance as  a  consequence.  He  had  to  go  home  by  back 
alleys  and  had  to  endure  the  mirth  of  his  friends  for  a 
long  time.  But  it  did  not  change  his  reactions  in  the 
least,  although  he  was  really  vexed  with  himself  and 
endeavored  to  be  conventional  and  self-controlled  for 
a  while.  The  point  is  that  F.  L.  attempts  inhibition  of 
generous  impulses  and  fails  as  ignominiously  as  a 
drunkard  struggling  with  the  desire  to  drink. 

Of  course  he  is  of  the  salt  of  the  earth.  Upon  such 
uninhibited  fellowship  feeling  as  his  rests  the  ethical 
progress  of  the  world.  A  dozen  inventors  contribute  less 
to  their  fellow  men  than  does  he.  For  their  contribu- 
tions may  be  used  to  destroy  or  enslave  their  fellows, 
and  it  is  a  commonplace  that  science  has  outstripped 
morals.  But  his  contributions  spread  kindly  feeling 
and  the  notion  of  the  brotherhood  of  man. 

The  over-inhibited,  those  whose  every  impulse  and 
desire  is  subjected  to  a  scrutiny  and  a  blocking,  often 
come  to  the  attention  of  the  neuropsychiatrist.  But 
there  are  many  "  normal "  people  who  fall  into  this 
group,  and  whose  conduct  throughout  life  is  marked  by 
a  scrupulosity  that  is  painful  to  behold.  The  over-in- 
hibition may  take  specific  directions,  as  in  the  thrifty 


SOME  CHARACTER  TYPES  383 

who  check  their  desires  in  the  wish  to  save  money,  or  the 
industrious  who  hold  up  their  pleasures  and  recreations 
in  the  fear  that  they  are  wasting  time.  A  sub-group  of 
the  over-inhibited  I  call  the  over-conscientious,  and  it 
is  one  of  these  whose  history  is  epitomized  here. 

K.  has  always  had  "  ingrowing  scruples,"  as  his  ex- 
asperated mother  once  said.  As  a  small  child  he  never 
obeyed  the  impulse  to  take  a  piece  of  cake  without  look- 
ing around  to  see  if  his  mother  and  father  approved.  He 
would  not  play  unreservedly,  in  the  whole-hearted  im- 
pulsive way  of  children,  but  always  held  back  in  his 
enjoyment  as  if  he  feared  that  perhaps  he  was  not  doing 
just  right.  When  he  started  to  go  to  school  his  fear 
of  doing  the  wrong  thing  made  him  appear  rather  slow, 
though  in  reality  he  was  bright.  The  other  children 
called  him  a  "  sissy,"  mistaking  his  conscientiousness 
for  cowardice.  This  grieved  him  very  much,  and  his 
father  undertook  to  educate  him  in  "  rough  "  ways,  in 
fighting  and  wrestling.  He  succeeded  in  this  to  the 
extent  that  K.  learned  to  fight  when  he  believed  that  he 
was  being  wronged,  but  he  never  seemed  to  learn  the 
aggressiveness  necessary  to  get  even  a  fair  share  of  his 
rights.  His  mother,  a  similar  type,  rather  encouraged 
Mm  in  this  virtue,  much  to  the  disgust  of  the  father. 

Not  to  spend  too  long  a  time  over  K.'s  history,  we 
may  pass  quickly  over  his  school  years  until  he  entered 
college.  He  was  a  "  grind  "  if  there  ever  was  one,  study- 
ing day  and  night.  He  had  developed  well  physically 
and  because  of  his  hard  work  stood  near  the  top  of  his 
class.  He  took  no  "  pleasures  "  of  any  kind,  —  that  is, 
he  played  no  cards,  went  to  no  dances,  never  took  in  a 
show  and  of  course  was  strictly  moral.  It  seems  that 
the  main  factor  that  held  him  back  was  the  notion  he 
had  imbibed  early  in  his  career  that  pleasure  itself  was 


384  jTHE  FOUNDATIONS  OF  PERSONALITY 

somehow  not  worthy,  that  an  ideal  of  work  made  a  sort 
of  sin  of  wasting  time.  Whenever  he  indulged  himself 
by  rest  or  relaxation,  even  in  so  innocent  a  way  as  to 
go  to  a  ball  game,  there  was  in  the  back  of  his  mind  the 
idea,  "  I  might  have  been  studying  this  or  that,  or 
working  on  such  a  subject ;  I  am  wasting  time,"  and  the 
pleasure  would  go.  By  nature  K.  was  sociable  and 
friendly  and  was  well  liked,  but  he  avoided  friendships 
and  social  life  because  of  the  unpleasant  reproaches  of 
his  work  conscience  and  the  rigor  of  his  work  inhibi- 
tions. He  grew  tired,  developed  a  neurasthenic  set  of 
symptoms,  and  thus  I  first  came  in  contact  with  him. 
Once  he  understood  the  nature  of  his  trouble,  which  I 
labeled  for  him  as  a  "  hypertrophied  work  conscience," 
he  set  himself  the  task  of  learning  to  enjoy,  of  throwing 
off  inhibition,  of  innocent  self-indulgence,  and  my  strong 
point  that  he  would  work  the  better  for  pleasure  took 
his  fancy  at  once.  He  succeeded  in  part  in  his  efforts, 
but  of  course  will  always  debate  over  the  right  and 
wrong  of  each  step  in  his  life. 

This  one  example  of  a  high  type  of  the  over-inhibited 
must  do  for  the  group.  There  is  a  related  type  who  in 
ordinary  speech  find  it  "  diflScult  to  make  up  their 
minds," —  in  other  words,  are  unable  to  choose.  Bleuler 
has  used  the  term  ambivalent,  thus  comparing  these 
individuals  to  a  chemical  element  having  two  bonds  and 
impelled  to  unite  with  two  substances.  The  ambivalent 
personalities  are  always  brought  to  a  place  where  they 
yearn  for  two  opposing  kinds  of  action  or  they  fear 
to  choose  one  affinity  of  action  as  against  the  other. 
They  are  in  the  position  of  the  unfortunate  swain  who 
sang,  "  How  happy  I  could  be  with  either,  were  t'other 
dear  charmer  away." 

M.  is  one  of  these  helpless  ambivalent  folk,  always 


SOME  CHAEACTER  TYPES  385 

running  to  others  for  advice  and  perplexed  to  a  frenzy 
by  the  choices  of  life.  "  What  shall  I  do?  "  is  his  prime 
question,  largely  because  he  fears  to  commit  himself  to 
any  line  of  action.  Once  a  man  chooses,  he  shuts  a 
great  many  doors  of  opportunity  and  gambles  with  Fate 
that  he  has  chosen  right.  M.  knows  this  and  lacks  self- 
confidence,  i.e.,  the  belief  that  he  will  choose  for  the 
best  or  be  able  to  carry  it  through.  He  lacks  the  gam- 
bling spirit,  the  willingness  to  put  his  destiny  to  for- 
tune. Often  M.  deliberates  or  rather  oscillates  for  so 
long  a  time  that  the  matter  is  taken  from  his  hands. 
Thus,  when  he  fell  in  love,  the  fear  of  being  refused,  of 
making  a  mistake,  prevented  him  from  action,  and  the 
young  woman  accepted  another,  less  ambivalent  suitor. 

M.  is  in  business  with  his  father  and  is  entirely  a 
subordinate,  because  he  cannot  choose.  He  carries  out 
orders  well,  is  very  amiable  and  gentle,  is  liked  and  at 
the  same  time  held  in  a  mild  contempt.  He  has  physical 
courage  but  has  not  the  hardihood  of  soul  to  take  on 
responsibility  for  choosing.  Sometimes  he  gets  good 
ideas,  but  never  dares  to  put  them  into  execution  and 
shifts  that  to  others. 

He  hates  himself  for  this  weakness  in  an  essential 
phase  of  personality  but  is  gradually  accepting  himself 
as  an  inferior  person,  despite  intelligence,  training  and 
social  connection. 

Yet  his  sister  is  exactly  the  opposite  type.  She  makes 
decisions  with  great  promptness,  never  hesitates,  is 
"  cocksure  "  and  aggressive.  If  M.  is  ambivalent,  his 
sister  B.  M.  is  univalent.  Choice  is  an  easy  matter  to 
her,  though  she  is  not  impulsive.  She  rapidly  deliber- 
ates. She  never  has  made  any  serious  errors  in  judg- 
ment, but  if  she  makes  a  mistake  she  shrugs  her  shoul- 
ders and  says,  "  It's  all  in  the  game."     Thus  she  is  a 


386   THE  FOUNDATIONS  OF  PERSONALITY 

leader  in  her  set,  for  if  some  difificulty  is  encountered, 
her  mind  is  quickly  at  work  and  prompt  with  a  solu- 
tion. If  she  is  not  brilliant,  and  she  is  not,  she  collects 
the  plans  of  her  associates  and  chooses  and  modifies 
until  she  is  ready  with  her  own  plan.  Her  father  sighs 
as  he  watches  her  and  regrets  that  she  is  not  a  man.  It 
does  not  occur  to  him  or  any  of  his  family,  including 
herself,  that  she  might  do  a  man's  work  in  the  business 
world. 

In  pathological  cases  the  inability  to  choose  becomes 
so  marked  as  to  make  it  impossible  for  the  patient  to 
choose  any  line  of  conduct.  "  To  do  or  not  to  do  " 
extends  into  every  relationship  and  every  situation.  The 
patient  cannot  choose  as  to  his  dress  or  his  meals ;  can- 
not decide  whether  to  stay  in  or  go  out,  finds  it  difficult 
to  choose  to  cross  the  street  or  to  open  a  door ;  is  thrown 
into  a  pendulum  of  yea  and  nay  about  speaking,  etc. 
This  psychasthenic  state,  the  folie  dtc  doute  of  the 
French,  is  accompanied  by  fear,  restlessness  and  an 
oppressive  feeling  of  unreality.  The  records  of  every 
neurologist  contain  many  such  cases,  most  of  whom 
recover,  but  a  few  go  on  to  severe  incurable  mental 
disease. 

I  pass  on,  without  regard  for  logic  or  completeness, 
to  a  personality  type  that  we  may  call  the  anhedonic 
or  simpler  a  restless,  not  easily  satisfied,  easily 
disgusted  group.  Some  of  these  are  cyclothymic,  over- 
emotional,  often  monothymic  but  I  am  discussing  them 
from  the  standpoint  of  their  satisfaction  with  life  and 
its  experiences.  The  ordinary  label  of  "  finicky  "  well 
expresses  the  type,  but  of  course  it  neglects  the  basic 
psychology.  This  I  have  discussed  elsewhere  in  this 
book  and  will  here  describe  two  cases,  one  a  congenital 
type  and  the  other  acquired. 


SOME  CHARACTER  TYPES  387 

T.  was  born  dissatisfied,  so  his  mother  avers.  As  a 
baby  he  was  "  a  difficult  feeding  ease  "  because  the  very 
slightest  cause,  the  least  change  in  the  milk,  upset  him, 
a  fact  attested  to  by  vigorous  crying.  Babies  have  a 
variability  in  desire  and  satisfaction  quite  as  much  as 
their  elders. 

Apparently  T.  thrived,  despite  his  start,  for  as  a 
child  he  was  sturdy  looking.  Nevertheless,  in  toys, 
games,  treats,  etc.,  he  was  hard  to  please  and  easy  to 
displease.  He  turned  up  his  nose  if  a  toy  were  not 
perfection,  and  he  had  to  have  his  food  prepared  accord- 
ing to  specification  or  his  appetite  vanished.  Moreover, 
he  had  a  very  limited  range  of  things  he  liked,  and  as 
time  went  on  he  extended  that  list  but  little.  He  was 
very  choice  in  his  clothes  —  not  at  all  a  regular  boy  — 
and  quite  disgusted  with  dirt  and  disorder.  "  A  little 
old  maid"  somebody  called  him,  having  in  mind  of 
course  the  traditional  maiden  lady. 

As  T.  grew  his  capacity  for  pleasure-feeling  did  not 
increase.  On  the  contrary  his  attention  to  the  details 
necessary  for  his  pleasure  made  of  him  one  of  those 
finicky  connoisseurs  who,  though  never  really  pleased 
with  anything,  get  a  sort  of  pleasure  in  pointing  out  the 
crudity  of  other  people's  tastes  and  pleasures.  This 
attitude  of  superiority  is  the  one  compensation  the 
finicky  have,  and  since  they  are  often  fluent  of  speech 
and  tend  to  write  and  lecture,  they  impose  their  notions 
of  good  and  bad  upon  others,  who  seek  to  escape  being 
"common."  In  T.'s  case  his  attitude  toward  food, 
clothes,  companions,  sports  and  work  created  a  tense 
disharmony  in  his  family,  and  one  of  his  brothers 
labeled  him  "  The  Kill-joy."  Secretly  envious  of  other 
people's  simple  enjoyment,  T.  made  strenuous  efforts  at 
times  to  overcome  his  repugnances  and  to  enlarge  the 


388  THE  FOUNDATIONS  OF  PERSONALITY 

scope  of  his  pleasures,  but  because  this  forfeited  for 
him  the  superiority  he  had  reached  as  a  very  "  refined  " 
person,  he  never  persisted  in  this  process. 

When  he  was  twenty  he  found  himself  the  theater  of 
many  conflicts.  He  was  weary  of  life,  yet  lusted  for 
experiences  that  his  hyperestheticism  would  not  permit 
him  to  take.  Sex  seemed  too  crude,  and  the  girls  of 
his  age  were  "  silly."  Yet  their  lure  and  his  own  internal 
tensions  dragged  him  to  one  place  after  another,  hoping 
that  he  would  find  the  perfect  woman,  able  to  under- 
stand him.  At  last  he  did  find  her,  so  he  thought,  in 
the  person  of  a  young  woman  of  twenty-five,  a  con- 
summate mistress  of  the  arts  of  femininity.  She  sized 
him  up  at  once,  played  on  his  vanity,  extolled  his  fine 
tastes  and  never  exposed  a  single  crudity  of  her  own, 
until  she  brought  him  to  the  point  where  his  passion 
for  her,  his  conviction  that  he  had  found  "  the  perfect 
woman,"  led  him  to  propose  marriage.  Then  came  the 
blow :  she  laughed  at  him,  called  him  a  silly  boy,  gave 
him  a  lecture  as  to  what  constituted  a  fine  man,  extoll- 
ing crudity,  vigor  and  virility  as  the  prime  virtues. 

His  world  was  shattered,  and  its  shadowy  pleasures 
gone.  At  first  his  parents  were  inclined  to  believe  that 
this  was  a  good  lesson,  that  T.  would  learn  from  this 
adventure  and  become  a  more  hardy  young  man.  In- 
stead he  became  sleepless,  restless  and  without  desire 
for  food  or  drink;  he  shunned  men  and  women  alike; 
he  stared  hollow-eyed  at  a  world  full  of  noise  and  mo- 
tion but  without  meaning  or  joy.  Deep  was  this  an- 
hedonia,  and  all  exhortations  to  "  brace  up  and  be  a 
man  "  failed.  Diversion,  travel  and  all  the  usual  medi- 
cal consultations  and  attentions  did  no  good. 

One  day  he  announced  to  his  family  that  he  was  all 
right,  that  soon  he  would  be  well.    He  seemed  cheerful, 


SOME  CHARACTER  TYPES  389 

talked  with  some  animation  and  dressed  himself  with 
unusual  care.  His  parents  rejoiced,  but  one  of  his 
brothers  did  not  like  what  he  called  a  "  gleam  "  in  T.'s 
eyes.  So  he  followed  him,  in  a  skillful  manner.  T. 
walked  around  for  a  while,  then  found  his  way  to  a 
bridge  crossing  a  swift  deep  river.  He  took  off  his 
coat,  but  before  he  could  mount  the  rail  his  watchful 
brother  was  upon  him.  He  made  no  struggle  and  con- 
sented to  come  back  home.  In  his  coat  was  a  letter 
stating  that  he  saw  no  use  in  living,  that  he  was  not 
taking  his  life  because  of  disappointment  in  love  but 
because  he  felt  that  he  never  could  enjoy  what  others 
found  pleasurable,  and  that  he  was  an  anomaly,  a  curse 
to  himself  and  others. 

He  was  sent  away  to  a  sanatorium  but  left  it  and 
came  home.  He  began  to  eat  and  drink  again,  found  he 
could  sleep  at  night  (the  sleepless  night  had  filled  him 
with  despair)  and  soon  swung  back  into  his  "  normal  " 
state.  He  passes  throughout  life  a  spectator  of  the  joys 
of  others,  wondering  why  his  grip  on  content  and  desire 
is  so  slender,  but  also  he  thinks  himself  of  a  finer  clay 
than  his  fellows. 

As  a  complement  to  this  case  let  me  cite  that  of  the 
ex-soldier  S.  He  reached  the  age  of  twenty- two  with 
a  very  creditable  histbryi  Born  of  middle-class  par- 
ents he  went  through  high  school  and  ranked  in  the 
upper  third  of  his  class  for  scholarship.  His  physique 
was  good ;  he  was  a  joyous,  popular  young  fellow ;  and 
wherever  he  went  was  pointed  out  as  the  clean  young 
American  so  representative  of  our  country.  That  means 
he  worked  hard  as  assistant  executive  in  a  production 
plant,  was  ambitious  to  get  ahead,  took  special  courses 
to  fit  himself,  read  a  good  deal  about  "  success  "  and 
how  to  reach  it,  dressed  well,  liked  his  fellow  mfen  and 


390  THE  FOUNDATIONS  OF  PERSONALITY 

more  than  liked  women,  enjoyed  sports,  a  good  time,  the 
theaters,  slept  well,  ate  well  and  surged  with  the  pas- 
sions and  longings  of  his  youth.  Had  any  one  said  to 
him,  "  What  is  there  to  live  for?  "  he  would  have  had 
no  answer  ready  merely  because  it  would  have  never 
occurred  to  him  that  any  one  could  really  ask  so  fool- 
ish a  question. 

Came  the  war.  Full  of  the  ardor  of  patriotism  and 
the  longing  for  the  great  experience,  he  enlisted.  He 
took  the  "  hardships  "  of  camp  life,  the  long  hikes,  the 
daily  drills,  the  food  dished  out  in  tins,  as  a  lark,  and 
his  hearty  fellowship  identified  him  with  the  army, 
with  its  profanity,  its  rough  friendliness,  its  grumbling 
but  quick  obedience  and  its  intense  purpose  to  "  show 
'em  what  the  American  can  do."  He  went  overseas 
and  learned  that  French  patriotism,  like  the  American 
brand,  did  not  prevent  profiteering,  and  that  enlistment 
in  a  common  cause  does  not  allay  or  abate  racial  preju- 
dices and  antagonisms.  This,  however,  did  not  prey  on 
his  mind,  for  he  took  his  Americanism  as  superior  with- 
out argument  and  was  not  especially  disappointed  be- 
cause of  French  customs  and  morals.  He  took  part  in 
several  battles,  made  night  attacks^  bayonetted  his  first 
man  with  a  horror  that  however  disappeared  under  the 
glory  of  victory. 

One  day  as  he  and  a  few  comrades  were  in  a  front 
line  trench,  "  Jeri^  "  placed  a  high  explosive  "  plump 
in  the  middle  of  it."  When  S.  recovered  consciousness, 
he  found  himself  half  covered  with  dirt  and  debris  of 
all  kinds,  and  when  he  crawled  out  and  brushed  himself 
off,  he  saw  that  of  all  his  comrades  he  alone  survived, 
and  that  they  were  mangled  and  mutilated  in  a  most 
gruesome  way.  "  Pieces  of  my  friends  everywhere,"  is 
his  terse  account.    He  lay  in  the  trench,  not  daring  to 


SOME  CHARACTER  TYPES  391 

move  for  hours,  the  bitterest  thoughts  assailing  him,  — 
anger,  hatred  and  disgust  for  war,  the  Germans,  his 
own  countrymen;  and  he  even  cursed  God.  When  he 
did  this  he  shuddered  at  his  blasphemy,  became  re- 
morseful and  prayed  for  forgiveness.  A  little  later  he 
crawled  out  of  the  trench  and  back  to  where  he  was 
picked  up  by  the  medical  corps  and  taken  to  a  hospital. 
He  was  examined,  nothing  wrong  was  found  and  he 
was  sent  back  to  duty. 

From  that  episode  dates  as  typical  an  anhedonia  as 
I  have  ever  seen.  Gradually  he  became  sleepless  and 
woke  each  day  more  tired  than  he  went  to  bed.  The 
food  displeased  him,  and  he  grumbled  over  what  were 
formerly  trifles.  He  wearied  easily,  and  nothing  seemed 
to  move  him  to  enthusiasm  or  desire.  He  gave  up 
friendship  after  friendship,  because  the  friends  an- 
noyed him  by  their  noise  and  boisterousness.  He 
dreaded  the  roar  of  the  guns  and  the  shriek  of  shells 
with  what  amounted  to  physical  agony.  He  brooded 
alone,  and  though  not  melancholy  in  the  positive  insane 
sense,  was  melancholy  in  the  disappearance  of  desire, 
joy,  energy,  interest  and  enthusiasm. 

Fortunately  the  armistice  came  at  this  time.  S.  was 
examined  and  discharged  as  well  because  he  made  no 
complaints,  for  he  was  anxious  to  get  home.  This  was 
his  one  great  desire.  At  home,  with  a  nice  bed  to  sleep 
in,  good  food  to  eat  and  the  pleasant  faces  of  his  own 
people,  his  "  nerves "  would  yield,  he  had  no  doubt. 
But  he  was  mistaken;  this  was  not  the  case.  He  be- 
came no  better,  and  though  he  tried  his  old  "  job,"  he 
found  that  he  could  not  find  the  energy,  enthusiasm  or 
concentration  necessary  for  success.  He  was  then 
referred  to  the  United  States  Public  Health  Service, 
where  I  saw  him,  and  he  became  my  patient. 


392  THE  FOUNDATIONS  OF  PERSONALITY 

My  first  problem  was  to  restore  the  power  of  sleeping. 
This  I  succeeded  in  doing  by  means  that  were  entirely 
"  physical."  With  that  accomplished,  the  man  became 
hopeful  of  further  results,  and  this  enabled  one  to  bring 
about  a  desire  for  food,  again  by  physical  means,  medi- 
cine, in  short.  The  problem  of  awaking  S.'s  interest 
simmered  down  to  that  of  finding  an  outlet  for  his  am- 
bition. The  Federal  Vocational  Board  granted  him  the 
right  to  take  up  a  business  course  in  a  college.  Though 
he  found  the  study  hard  at  first,  he  was  encouraged  to 
keep  on  and  told  to  expect  little  of  himself  at  first. 
This  is  an  important  point,  for  if  a  man  holds  himself 
to  a  high  standard  under  conditions  such  as  those  of 
S.,  then  failure  brings  a  discouragement  that  upsets 
the  treatment.  At  any  rate  this  method  of  readjust- 
ment, with  its  reliance  on  medicines  to  bring  sleep  and 
appetite  and  on  training  to  bring  hope  and  relief  from 
introspection,  worked  splendidly. 

The  fact  is  that  no  abstruse  complicated  psychologi- 
cal analysis  was  necessary  here  or  in  most  cases.  A 
man  is  "jarred"  from  light-hearted  health  to  a  grim 
discouraged  state.  This  discouragement  brings  with  it 
sleeplessness  and  loss  of  appetite,  and  there  gradually 
develops  a  series  of  habits  which  lower  endurance  and 
energy.  The  habit  elements  in  this  condition  are  not 
enough  recognized,  and  also  the  fact  that  most  of  the 
disability  is  physical  in  its  development  though  psycho- 
logical at  the  start.  That  is,  A.  had  a  severe  emotional 
reaction  to  a  horrible  experience;  this  brought  about 
insomnia  and  disordered  nutrition,  and  these,  by  low- 
ering the  endurance  and  ability,  brought  to  being  a 
vicious  circle  of  fatigue  and  depression,  in  which  fatigue 
caused  depression  and  depression  increased  fatigue. 
The  treatment  must  be  directed  at  first  to  the  physical 


SOME  CHARACTER  TYPES  393 

factors,  and  with  these  conquered  the  acquired  forms 
of  anhedonia  usually  yield  readily. 

It  would  be  interesting  to  consider  other  types  re- 
lated to  the  anhedonic  personality.  The  complainer, 
the  whiner,  the  nag,  all  these  are  basically  people  who 
are  hard  to  satisfy.  The  artistic  temperament  (found 
rather  frequently  in  the  non-artistic)  is  hyperesthetic, 
uncontrolled,  irritably  egoistic  and  demands  homage 
and  service  from  others  which  exceeds  the  merit  of  the 
individual ;  in  other  words,  there  is  added  to  the  anhe- 
donic element  an  unreasonableness  that  is  peculiarly 
exasperating.  I  pass  these  interesting  people  by  and 
turn  to  the  opposite  of  the  anhedonic  group,  the  group 
that  is  hearty  in  tastes  and  appetites,  easily  pleased  as 
a  rule  and  often  crude  in  their  relish  of  life.  There 
are  two  main  divisions  of  these  hearty  simple  people, — 
those  who  are  untrained  and  relatively  uneducated,  and 
whose  simplicity  may  disappear  under  cultivation,  and 
another  type  —  cultivated,  educated,  wise  —  who  still 
retain  unspoiled  appetite  and  hearty  enjoyment. 

Briefly  let  me  introduce  Dr.  O.,  an  athlete  in  his 
youth  and  always  a  lover  of  the  great  outdoors. 

O.  is  Homeric  in  the  simplicity  of  his  tastes.  A  house 
is  a  place  in  which  to  sleep,  clothes  are  to  keep  one  warm, 
food  is  to  eat  and  the  manner  of  its  service  is  an  in- 
different matter.  He  enjoys  with  almost  huge  pleasure 
good  things  to  eat  and  good  things  to  drink,  but  as  he 
puts  it,  "  I  am  as  much  at  home  with  corned  beef  and 
cabbage  as  I  am  with  any  epicurean  chef  d'ceiivre.  I 
like  the  feel  of  silk  next  my  body,  but  cotton  pleases 
me  as  much."  He  is  clean  and  bathes  regularly,  but 
has  no  repulsion  against  dirt  and  disorder.  At  home, 
among  the  utmost  refinements  of  our  present-day  life, 
he  prefers  the  rough  bare  essentials  of  existence.     To 


394  THE  FOUNDATIONS  OF  PERSONALITY 

him  beauty  is  not  exotic,  but  everywhere  present,  and 
he  sees  it  in  a  workman  clad  in  overalls  and  breaking 
stone  quite  as  much  as  in  a  carefully  harmonized  land- 
scape. He  has  no  pose  about  the  beauty  of  nature  as 
against  the  beauty  of  man's  creations,  and  he  thinks 
that  a  puffing  freight  engine,  dragging  a  load  of  cars 
up  a  grade,  is  as  much  a  thing  to  enthuse  about  as  a 
graceful  deer  sniffing  the  scent  of  the  hunter  in  some 
pine  grove. 

Imbued  with  a  zeal  for  living  and  a  desire  for  ex- 
perience, O.  has  not  been  as  successful  as  one  more 
cautious  and  less  impetuous  might  have  been.  He  loves 
his  profession  so  well  that  he  would  rather  spend  a  day 
on  an  interesting  case  in  the  ward  of  some  hospital 
than  to  treat  half  a  dozen  rich  patients  in  his  consult- 
ing room.  His  purpose  is  indeed  unified;  he  seeks  to 
learn  and  to  impart,  but  the  making  of  money  seems 
to  him  a  necessary  irrelevance,  almost  an  impertinent 
intrusion  upon  the  real  purposes  of  life.  He  is  eager 
to  know  people,  he  shows  a  naive  curiosity  about  them, 
an  interest  that  flatters  and  charms.  All  the  phenomena 
of  life  —  esoteric,  commonplace,  queer  and  conven- 
tional —  are  grist  to  his  mill. 

His  sexual  life  has  not  differed  greatly  from  that  of 
other  men.  In  his  early  youth  his  passions  outran  his 
inhibitions,  and  he  tasted  of  this  type  of  experience 
with  the  same  gusto  with  which  he  delved  into  books. 
As  he  reached  early  manhood  he  fell  in  love  and  pledged 
himself  to  chastity.  Though  he  fell  out  of  love  soon 
his  pledge  remained  in  full  force,  and  though  he  cursed 
himself  as  a  fool  he  held  himself  aloof  from  sex  adven- 
ture. When  he  was  twenty-seven  he  again  fell  in  love, 
had  an  impetuous  and  charming  courtship  and  mar- 
ried.    He  loves  his  wife,  and  there  is  in  their  intimacy 


SOME  CHARACTER  TYPES  395 

a  buoyant  yet  controlled  passion  which  values  love  for 
its  own  sake.  He  enters  into  his  duties  as  father  with 
the  same  zeal  and  appetite  that  characterizes  his  every 
activity. 

O.  is  no  mystic,  proclaiming  his  unity  with  all  exist- 
ence, in  the  fashion  of  Walt  Whitman.  Rather  he  is  a 
man  with  a  huge  capacity  for  pleasure,  not  easily  dis- 
gusted or  annoyed,  with  desires  that  reach  in  every 
direction  yet  with  controlled  purpose  to  guide  his  life. 
As  he  passes  into  middle  age  he  finds  his  pleasures 
narrowing,  as  all  men  do,  and  he  finds  his  appetites  and 
tastes  are  becoming  more  restricted.  This  is  because 
his  purpose  becomes  more  dominant,  his  habits  are 
more  imperious,  his  energy  less  exuberant.  In  thought 
O.  is  almost  a  pessimist  because  his  knowledge  of  life, 
his  intelligence  and  his  sympathy  make  it  difficult  to 
understand  the  need  of  suffering,  of  disease  and  of  con- 
flict. But  in  emotion  he  still  remains  an  optimist,  glad 
to  be  alive  at  any  price  and  rejoicing  in  the  life  of  all 
things. 

Apropos  of  this  contradiction  between  thought  and 
mood,  it  is  sometimes  found  reversed.  There  are  those 
whose  philosophy  is  optimistic,  who  will  not  see  aught 
but  good  in  the  world,  yet  whose  facial  expression  and 
actions  exhibit  an  essential  melancholy. 

In  every  category  of  character  there  are  specialists, 
individuals  whose  main  reactions  are  built  around  one 
great  trait.  Thus  there  are  those  whose  egoism  takes 
the  form  of  pride  in  family,  or  in  personal  beauty,  or 
some  intellectual  capacity,  or  in  being  independent  of 
others,  who  worship  self-reliance  or  self-importance. 
There  are  the  individuals  whose  social  instincts  express 
themselves  in  loquacity,  in  a  talkativeness  that  is  the 
main  joy  of  their  lives,  though  not  at  all  the  joy  of 


396  THE  FOUNDATIONS  OF  PERSONALITY 

other  lives.  A  fascinating  series  of  personalities  in 
this  respect  come  to  my  mind  —  L.  B.,  who  talks  at 
people,  never  with  them,  since  he  seems  to  take  no  note 
of  their  replies;  T.  K.,  who  seems  to  regard  conversa- 
tion as  largely  a  means  of  demonstrating  her  superi- 
ority, for  she  picks  her  subjects  with  the  care  a  general 
selects  his  battlefield ;  F.,  who  is  a  born  pedagogue  and 
seeks  to  instruct  whoever  listens  to  him,  whose  con- 
versation is  a  lecture  and  a  monologue;  R.  O.,  the 
reticent,  says  little  but  that  pertinent  and  relevant, 
cynical  and  shrewd ;  and  R.  V.,  who  says  little  and  that 
with  timidity  and  error.  So  there  are  specialists  in 
caution  and  "common  sense,"  self -controlled,  never 
rash,  calculating,  cool  and  egotistic,  narrow  and  suc- 
cessful. Every  one  knows  this  type,  as  every  one  knows 
the  "  fool,"  with  his  poor  judgment,  his  unwise  confi- 
dence in  himself  and  others,  his  lack  of  restraint.  There 
is  the  tactful  man,  conciliating,  pliant,  seeking  his 
purposes  through  the  good  will  of  others  which  he  ob- 
tains by  "  oil "  and  agreeableness,  and  there  is  the 
aggressive  man,  preferring  to  fight,  energetic,  at  times 
rash,  apt  to  be  domineering,  and  crashing  on  to  victory 
or  defeat  according  to  the  caliber  of  his  opponents  and 
the  nature  of  the  circumstances. 

Those  whose  ego  feeling  is  high,  whose  desire  for 
superiority  matches  up  well  with  their  feeling  of  supe- 
riority are  often  called  the  conceited.  Really  they  are 
conceited  only  if  they  show  their  feelings,  as,  for  exam- 
ple, does  W.  Wherever  he  goes  W.  seeks  to  occupy  the 
center  of  the  stage,  brags  of  his  achievements  and  his 
fine  qualities.  "  I  am  the  kind  "  is  his  prefix  to  his 
bragging.  W.  thinks  that  everything  he  does  or  says 
is  interesting  to  others,  and  even  that  his  illnesses  are 
fascinating  to  others.     If  he  has  a  cold  he  takes  a  re- 


SOME  CHARACTER  TYPES  397 

markable  pride  in  detailing  every  pain  and  ache  and 
every  degree  of  temperature,  as  if  the  experience  were 
remarkable  and  somehow  creditable.  But  W.  is  very 
jealous  of  other's  achievements  and  is  bored  to  death 
except  when  he  can  talk  or  perform. 

W.  does  not  know  how  to  camouflage  his  egoism,  but 
F.  does.  Fully  convinced  of  his  own  superiority  and 
with  a  strong  urge  at  all  times  to  demonstrate  this,  he 
"  knows  enough  "  to  camouflage,  to  disguise  and  modify 
its  manifestations.  In  this  way  he  manages  to  be  popu- 
lar, just  as  W.  is  decidedly  unpopular,  and  many  mis- 
take him  for  modest.  When  he  wishes  to  put  over  his 
own  opinion  he  prefaces  his  statements  by  "  they  say," 
and  though  whatever  organization  he  enters  he  wishes 
to  lead,  he  manages  to  give  the  impression  that  he  is 
reluctant  to  take  a  prominent  part.  A  man  of  ability 
and  good  judgment,  the  narrow  range  of  F.'s  sympa- 
thies, his  lack  of  sincere  cordial  feeling,  is  hidden  by  a 
really  artistic  assumption  of  altruism  that  deceives  all 
save  those  who  through  long  acquaintance  know  his  real 
character.  One  sees  through  W.  on  first  meeting,  he 
wears  no  mask  or  disguise;  but  F.  defies  detection, 
though  their  natures  are  not  radically  different  except 
in  wisdom  and  tact. 

Half  and  more  of  the  actions,  poses  and  speech  of 
men  and  women  is  to  demonstrate  superiority  or  to 
avoid  inferiority.  There  are  some  who  feel  inwardly 
inferior,  yet  disguise  this  feeling  successfully.  This 
feeling  of  inferiority  may  arise  from  purely  accidental 
matters,  such  as  appearance,  deformity,  tone  of  voice, 
etc.,  and  the  individual  may  either  hide,  become  seclu- 
slve  or  else  brazen  it  out,  so  to  speak. 

A  famous  Boston  physician  was  a  splendid  example 
of  a  brusque,  overbearing  mask  used  to  hide  a  shrinking, 


398  THE  FOUNDATIONS  OF  PERSONALITY 

timid,  subjectively  inferior  personality.  Always  very 
near-sighted  and  unattractive,  he  was  essentially  shy 
and  modest  but  decided  or  felt  that  this  was  a  rough 
world  and  the  way  to  get  ahead  was  to  be  rough.  To-, 
wards  the  weak  and  sick  he  was  kindness  itself  — 
gentle,  sympathetic  and  patient  —  but  towards  his  col- 
leagues he  was  a  boor.  Distant,  haughty,  quick  to 
demand  all  the  consideration  due  him,  he  was  noted  far 
and  wide  for  the  caustic  way  he  attacked  others  for 
their  opinions  and  beliefs  and  the  respect  he  required 
for  his  own.  The  general  opinion  of  physicians  was 
that  he  was  a  conceited,  arrogant,  aristocratic  man, 
and  he  w^as  avoided  except  for  his  medical  opinion, 
which  was  usually  very  sound.  Those  admitted  to  the 
sanctum  of  this  man's  real  self  knew  him  to  be  really 
modest  and  self-deprecatory,  anxious  to  do  right  and 
almost  obsessed  by  the  belief  that  he  knew  but  little 
compared  to  others. 

One  day  there  walked  into  my  offlce  a  lady,  head  of  a 
large  enterprise,  who  had  been  pointed  out  to  me  some 
time  previously  as  the  very  personification  of  self-as- 
surance and  superiority.  A  dignified  woman  of  middle 
age,  whose  reserve  and  correct  manners  impressed  one 
at  once ;  she  bore  out  in  career  and  casual  conversation 
this  impression  of  one  whose  confidence  and  belief  in 
herself  were  not  misplaced,  in  other  words,  a  harmoni- 
ously developed  egotist.  What  she  came  to  consult  me 
about,  was  —  her  feeling  of  inferiority! 

All  of  her  life,  said  she,  she  had  been  overawed  by 
others.  As  a  girl  her  mother  ruled  her,  and  her  younger 
sister,  more  charming  and  more  vivacious,  was  the  pet 
of  the  family.  Brought  up  in  a  strict  church,  she  de- 
veloped a  firmness  of  speech  and  conduct  that  inhibited 
the  frankness  and  friendliness  of  her  social  contacts. 


SOME  CHARACTER  TYPES  399 

Because  of  this,  and  her  overserious  attitudes  generally, 
girls  of  her  own  age  rather  avoided  her,  and  she  became 
painfully  self-conscious  in  their  company  as  well  as  in 
the  company  of  men.  She  wanted  to  "  let  go "  but 
could  not,  and  in  time  felt  that  there  was  something 
lacking  in  her,  that  people  laughed  at  her  behind  her 
back  and  that  no  one  really  liked  her.  Her  reaction 
to  this  was  to  determine  that  she  would  not  show  her 
real  feelings,  that  she  would  deal  with  the  world  on  a 
basis  of  "  business  only  "  and  cut  out  friendship  from 
her  life.  Her  intelligence  and  her  devotion  to  her  work 
brought  her  success,  and  she  would  have  gone  her  way 
without  regard  for  her  "  inferiority  complex  "  had  not 
chance  thrown  in  her  way  a  young  woman  colleague 
who  saw  through  her  elder's  pose  and  became  her  friend. 
My  patient  drank  in  this  friendship  with  an  avidity  the 
greater  for  her  long  loneliness,  and  she  was  very  happy 
until  the  younger  woman  fell  in  love  with  a  man  and 
began  to  neglect  her  colleague. 

This  broke  Miss  B.'s  spirit.  "  Had  I  not  known 
friendship  I  might  have  gone  on,  but  now  I  feel  that 
every  one  must  see  what  a  fool  I  am  and  what  a  fool 
I  have  been.  I  am  more  shy  than  ever,  I  feel  as  if 
every  one  were  really  stronger  than  I  am,  and  that  some 
day  everybody  will  see  through  my  pose,  —  and  thiBn 
where  will  I  be?  " 

Hide-and-go-seek  is  one  of  the  great  games  of  adults 
as  well  as  of  children.  We  hide  our  own  defects  and 
seek  the  defects  of  others  in  order  to  avoid  inferiority 
and  to  feel  competitive  superiority.  But  there  is  a 
deep  contradiction  in  our  natures:  we  seek  to  display 
ourselves  as  we  are  to  those  who  we  feel  love  us,  and 
we  hide  our  real  self  from  the  enemy  or  the  stranger. 
The  protective  marking  of  birds  and  insects  is  ama- 


400  THE  FOUNDATIONS  OF  PERSONALITY 

teurish  compared  to  the  protective  marking  we  apply 
to  ourselves. 

I  forbear  from  depicting  further  character  types. 
People  are  not  as  easily  classified  as  automobiles,  and 
the  combinations  possible  exceed  computation.  Charac- 
ter growth,  in  each  individual  human  being,  is  a  growth 
in  likeness  to  othei*s  and  a  growth  in  unlikeness,  as 
well.  As  we  move  from  childhood  to  youth,  and  thence 
to  middle  and  old  age,  qualities  appear  and  recede,  and 
the  personality  passes  along  to  unity  and  harmony  or 
else  there  is  disintegration.  He  who  believes  as  I  do 
that  the  Grecian  sage  was  immortally  right  when  he 
enjoined  man  to  know  himself  will  agree  that  though 
understanding  character  is  a  difficult  discipline  it  is 
the  principal  science  of  life.  We  are  only  starting  such 
a  science;  we  need  to  approach  our  subject  with  can- 
dor and  without  prejudice.  Though  our  subject  brings 
us  in  direct  contact  with  the  deepest  of  problems,  the 
meaning  of  life,  the  nature  of  the  Ego  and  the  source  of 
consciousness,  these  we  must  ignore  as  out  of  our  knowl- 
edge. Limiting  ourselves  to  a  humble  effort  to  know 
our  fellow  men  and  our  own  selves,  we  shall  find  that 
our  efforts  not  only  add  to  our  knowledge  but  add  un- 
measurably  to  our  sympathy  with  and  our  love  for  our 
fellows. 


INDEX 


INDEX 


ACBOHEOALT    16 

Activity,  impulse  to 218]^. 

Adjustment   and   sublima- 
tion     200 

Admiration     190 

and  common  people 194 

and  ideals 192 

Alcohol,  and  Habit 62 

Anger   178]^. 

and  ego  injury 179 

and   health 180 

and   politeness 180 

and  wrongs  of  others 179 

Anhedonia 208;f. 

and  sickness 210 

causes  of  210]f 

symptoms    of 208 

Anhedonic    temperament 209 

Aphasia    51,  62 

Asceticism  325 

Association,  types  of 112 

Associations,  irrelevant 112 

Awe 196 

Bacon,  Idols  of  Market 

Place 117 

Beauty,  as  goal  of  women. ...  41 
Brain  injury  and  person- 
ality  9,  10,  Uff. 

Censor  ( Freudian) 93 

Character,    and    Hydro- 
cephalus       9 

disharmony  in 332 

evolution   of 213 

organic  nature  of Iff. 

organizing  energy  of 75 

types 338/f. 

ambivolent 384 

anhedonic 386-387 

conversational 396 

cyclothvmic 354 

egoists' 395-396 

explosive 352 

hearty 393 


Character,  types,   continusd 

hyperkinetic 338 

hyperkinetic,    uncon- 
trolled  341 

hypochondriac 373 

hypokinetic 344 

hypokinetic,  irritable 347 

introspective 370 

mesokinetic 343 

monothymic,  fear 373 

overemotional 352 

overgenerous 381 

paranoiac 364 

over-inhibited 383 

sex   types 380 

stolid 347 

subjectively  inferior 397 

under-inhibited 375 

Characters,  variability  of 42 

Choice  and  cerebrum Ill 

Coenesthesia 83 

Compensation  and  escape 155 

Complex  Freudian 91 

Conscience i5ff. 

individual 160 

Consciousness,  and  the  new 

nature    of 80 

Cortex,    functions   of Ill 

Courage 1 

and  immortality 200 

and  tradition 198 

and  usefulness 199 

in  relation  to  strength 198 

Courtesy,  meaning  of 239 

Credulity 225 

Cretinism 14 

Criticism,  adverse 237 

Cure-alls 204 

Delinquency  and  En- 

VTRONMEnVT 33 

Dementia  Prsecox,  disturb- 
ance of  will  in 119 

Desire 215f. 

Dialogue,  of  thought 117 


404 


INDEX 


Disgust 181f . 

and  manners    181 

and  passion 182 

Domesticity,  nature  of 307 

Domestic  man 309 

woman 311 

Dreams,  Freudian  theory  of . .  93 

Duty 159f. 

and  choice 159 

and  freedom 162]^. 

Ego,  Development  or 217 

Ego    feeling,    narrow    and 

broad 217 

Emotions,  control  of 188 

nature    of 101 

Endocrinal    glands   and 

character 12 

Energy    feeling,   and  com- 
petition   169 

and  doubt 169 

and  faith 167 

and  hope  166 

and  stimuli 165 

and  the  opinion  of  others . .  168 

release    164]^. 

types 265^. 

Ethics,  origin  of 27 

Excitement,  and  anhedonia . . .  126 

and  neurasthenia 126 

and  pain-pleasure 128 

as  play 317 

nature  of 124]^. 

seeking  of 127 

spreading  of  in  childhood . .  .  125 

Experience,  seeking  of 223 

Failube,  Escape  From 156 

Faith    331 

Fatigue  and  personality 17 

Fear    niff- 

and  anger 177 

and  contagion  of 172 

and  health 180 

and  worry 176 

of  death,  reactions  to 173^. 

value  of 172 

Fellowship  and  superiority. .  .  .231 

Fetishism    299 

Flattery    242 

Follower,  disciplinability  of.  .  .279 

loyalty  of 278 

qualities    of 277 

Frazier    29 


Free  association  method   (of 

Freud)    94 

Freud,  criticism  of Mff. 

Freudianism    90ff. 

Gall  and  Phrenology 3 

Galton,   Francis,  on  race- 
unity    28 

Gang    life 34 

General  Paresis  and  char- 
acter     9,  10 

Gregarious  feeling,  growth 

of    221 

Group,   and   character 28jy. 

Habit  and  Constipation 57 

and  Sleep 57 

and  Tics 64 

formation    55 

Habits,  breaking  bad 6Qff. 

tyranny  of 60^. 

analyses  of  types  of 69 

"Having   one's   way" 242 

Hate   148]?. 

and  groups 151 

and  self -insight 144 

and  unlikeness 150 

Help,  asking  and  giving 229 

Heredity  and  character 22 

Hobhouse,  on  instinct 104 

Hocking,  on  deferment  of 

desire  203 

Holmes,  Oliver  Wendell,  on 

Habit   61 

Honesty,   an  J  dishonesty 281 

Humor,  and  inhibition 321 

motives    of 319 

nature    of 317 

technique  of 319 

Hyperthyroidism   15 

Hysteria 20,  86f. 

and  Magic 88 

Charcot  on 86 

Hysterical    anesthesia 89 

attacks    87 

paralyses     87 

temperament    90 

Hall,  Stanley,  and  "taedium 

vitae"    146 

Idealists,  Mabtybdom  of  . . .  233jf . 

Identity  and  injury 10 

Inferiority,  feeling 155 

seeking  relief  from 63 

Inhibition ^W' 


INDEX 


405 


Instinct   103 

and   organic   periodicity. ..  .108 

Instincts,    inhibition    of 107 

Interests,   and   use 138 

competitive  nature  of 137 

nature    of 132 

pathological     140j3^. 

Interiorized  vs.  exteriorized 

types    133J9F. 

Intelligence,  and  brain 109 

nature  of 106 

practical 115 

Imitation    225 

James,  William 7,  18 

and  emotions 102 

Joy   and   sorrow 184 

Lankesteb,  Sib  Edwin  Ray  . .  25 

Leadership     275j9f. 

Love,    fraternal 144 

friendship    145 

parental  141)5^. 

sex    145 

Manic    Depressive   In- 
sanity AND  Self- 

feelinq  153 

Masochism    297 

Memory    51]5F. 

and  use  value 52 

rules  for  bettering 53 

Microcosmus  and  macrocos- 

mus    36 

Mind  and  Body,  relation  of . .     7 

Miracles  and  hysteria 88 

Monotony 129jgF. 

and    fatigue 130 

and   industry 130 

results    of 129 

Mood,   origin   of 18 

Munsterberg,  and  Free  Will . .  120 
Myxoedema  15 

Nietzsche   29 

Non-domestic,  man 309 

woman  310 

Nose  and  character  study 2 

Opinion,  Poweb  op 40 

Originality    115 

PalMISTBY    AND    CHABACTEB 

Study 4 

Paranoiac,  the 290 


Parenthood  feeling 296 

Patience 203)9^. 

Phobias    177 

Phrenology  and  character 

study   3 

Physiognomy  and  character 

study    1 

Pity    Ulff. 

self    147 

Play,  of  adults 314j9F. 

of  children 314 

Plutarch  and  Wills 195 

Praise  and  blame 37)9''. 

Purpose,  and  disease 248 

over-unification  of 249 

through    force 258 

through  persuasion 260 

through  strategy 261 

through  weakness 263 

vs.  pleasure 257 

Purposes,  canalization  of 247 

Reactions,  Mixed  Natube 

OF   100 

Reality,  adjustment  to 254 

Rebel,  the  280 

Reflexes   72 

Relaxation,  need  of 131 

Religion,  and  disaster 330 

definition  of 330 

development    of 328 

Respectability 238 

Reward  and  punishment 37 jf. 

Revenge 151 

Sadism    296 

Self,    united 121 

Self-disgust 154 

Self-love    152 

Sensual  Pleasure,  Law  of ... .   47 

Sex   adventurer,    the 302 

characters  293 

glands  and  character ....  16,  17 

modesty     300 

passion    298 

pressure     301 

Shame    183 

Sickness    and    the    child's 

character     19 

Sick  souls 135 

Sincerity  and  insincerity 287 

Skepticism    226 

Skill,    motor    and   intelli- 
gence     114 

Smoking  and   relief 65 


406 


INDEX 


Social,  Heredity 26ff. 

and   Jew 31 

Instincts    2Qff. 

spread   of   feeling 157 

Speech  and  Intelligence 116 

Stimulation     70]gf. 

Struggle,  of  the  two  gen- 
erations   312 

Surprise    189 

and  "cool  headedness" 190 

Subconsciousness  and  Freu- 

dianism    91ff. 

and  visceral  activity 84 

theories   of 82 

Sympathy  and  antipathy 188 

Taste 324 

Tender   feeling ^^^ff- 

Thought  and  Power 118 

Thyroid  gland,  and  char- 
acter        14 

Trotter,  on  the  group 37 

Trustfulnefls    289 


Truthfulness,  and  untruth- 
fulness     284]9f. 

Tyndall,  and  thought 7 

Unconventional,  The 241 

Vegetative  Neevous  Sys- 
tem    83 

Wallas,  Graham,  on  De- 
sire     102 

Weber-Fechner  law 81 

SVill  119f. 

definition  of 122 

freedom  of 118 

Wills,    PluraUty    of 121 

Wish,   and   magic ^05 

Words,  danger  of 117 

Work,  and  necessity 267 

and    self-escape 267 

Work-eiBciency,  and  indus- 
trialism    271 

Work-couacience    270 


INftN-R^F^MI 


SWVAD'QHS 


''The  book  deserves  to  be  widely  read,  and  mil,  without  doubt, 
help  many  women  to  help  themselves." — Boston  Herald. 


The  Nervous  Housewife 


By  ABRAHAM  MYERSON,  M.D. 

Visiting  Physician  Nervous  Department,  Boston  City  Hospital 

and  Beth  Israel  Hospital.    Assistant  Professor  of  Neurology, 

Tufts  College  Medical  School. 

Crown  8vo.     Cloth.     27S  pages. 


"The  author  has  clearly  grasped  the  significance  in  human  life 
of  the  'm-ge  to  put  oneself  across'  and  sees  with  great  clarity  the 
nervous  reactions  oalled  forth  by  a  balking  of  this  urge.  .  .  The 
book  is  written  very  entertainingly  and  with  a  charm  rarely  met 
with  in  medical  treatises." — Mental  Hygiene,  New  York. 

"I  wish  every  woman  subject  to  nervousness  or  nervous  pros- 
tration would  read  Dr.  Myerson's  'The  Nervous  Housewife.  It 
would  reveal  many  of  them  to  themselves.  While  diagnosis  is 
not  cure,  it  is  the  first  stage  of  cure.  Many  women  can  cure 
themselves  once  they  get  wise  to  themselves — and  that  'The 
Nervous  Housewife'  will  do." — Dr.  W.  A.  Evans  in  his  newspaper 
column  "How  to  Keep  Well." 

"Despite  his  fund  of  scientific  knowledge  he  writes  so  simply  and 
clearly  that  he — or  she — who  runs  may  read,  and  so  humanly  that 
he  wins  the  reader's  friendship." — New  York  Herald. 

"There  is  found  in  Dr.  Myerson's  book  neither  condemnation 
nor  mockery,  but  a  sympathetic  comprehension  of  that  which 
makes  nervous  housewives." — New  York  Medical  Journal. 


LITTLE,    BROWN    &    CO.,  Publishers 
34  Beacon  Street,  Boston 


UNIVERSITY  OF  CALIFORNIA  LIBRARY,  LOS  ANGELES 
EDUCATION  AND  PSYCHOLOGY  LIBRARY 

This  books  is  DUE  on  the  last  date  stamped  below. 


MAY  3    1966 
MAY  2  4  1966 


.PR  23  1S58 


Form  L9-10m-8,'65(F6230s8)4939A 


UCLA-ED/PSYCH  Library 

BF  818  iyi99f 


L  005  621  931  4 


UNIVERSITY  of  CALIFORNIA 

AT 

LOS  ANGELES 

LIBRARY 


